Sin's of the Father
by wrath
Summary: IT'S FINALLY OVER:The Sin's of man will eventualy destroy him- Jobe comes to learn of this as the world around him slowy deteriorates and his only company are the mad and guilty. Now he must also ask himself which is he...
1. welcome to Silent Hill

Silent Hill

Sin's of the Father

Chapter 1: welcome to Silent Hill

The road small road snaked between the forests of pine trees, like some sickly, gray serpent. A car sped along it, appearing from the thick fog that had fallen over the area. There was something about the light blue paint job that didn't fit in with the ghostly surroundings. Inside, two young men were seated in the front. At the wheel sat an African-American, around 22 years old. A black-sleeved top peeked out from underneath his buttoned gray shirt. From the pocket of his green trousers, he pulled out a small mobile phone.

" Damn it." He muttered under his breath. His companion groggily opened his eyes and raised his head from the side window.

"What's wrong, Jobe?" he ran his hand through his blond hair.

 "There's no reseption out here, Julia wanted me to call her." Jobe sighed as he put the phone back into his pocket. "You know how anxious she gets if I don't." He smirked to him-self. "She'd probably call out a search party if I didn't get in touch." 

"Probably all this fog…" His friend trailed off as he peered through the window. "Sure is heavy."

A road sign suddenly materialized on the roadside before the car passed it. Phil jerked his neck round, trying to get a glimpse of what it said. "What'd it say?" he asked.

"Silent Hill, two miles."

Phil slammed his head into the back of the headrest. "Man, we've got ages to go." 

"Yeh, well many it would be a good idea to stop there, it's getting late and I don't want to drive through all this fog at night." Jobe shuddered as he looked out of the side window. On one side of the road, it disappeared into a deep gorge and the other rose up into the fog but he could barely make out the trees that ran up its sides. He felt as though he was in some Stephan King novel.

"Like hell we're stopping there, it's some town full of back water hicks. Probably never seen a car before."

"Didn't you use to live there?"

Phil shut up abruptly and retuned his gaze to the car window. Silence seemed to leak into the car, smothering even the thought of conversation. Jobe knew that he'd crossed the line mentioning that Phil lived there, as he'd always been almost ashamed of his roots. All Jobe knew about his best friends past was that when Phil was five, his parents had moved away from the town after a fire or something broke out in the town. Jobe had heard that it had something to do with a religious cult or something, all though this was probably someone's attempt to glamorize the fact that someone had left the oven on over night.  He snapped back to reality when he heard his friend sigh angrily and reach out to the car radio. As he turned the knob, white noise filled the car and Phil returned to looking out the window, sullenly. Jobe didn't dare to turn it off with the mood Phil was in. He closed his eyes for a moment. Phil had such a temper prob

"SHIT!!"

Jobe opened his eye's to see what had set his friend off and his eyes only just registered the shadow that they were speeding towards in the middle of the road. 

"Aw hell…"

He slammed his foot on the break as Phil threw his arms over his face in an attempt to brace himself for the imminent collision. As Jobe span the wheel of the car, he felt it hit into whatever had been in the road. 

The impact ripped the car from the road as the vehicle slammed into it. There was a crack as the windshield shattered into a million pieces but the sound was lost in a bellowing scream. Jobe didn't know if it was he or his friend who had let out the shrike as his world was twisted up side down at a sickening velocity. The car tipped on its side and the rolled several times before it came to a screeching halt, it's underside exposed to the air like some grotesque tortoise. For a moment, the wheels still span as the car uttered one last choked groan. 

And then the hills were silent one more.


	2. Abandoned

Ok, I forgot to do this in the first chapter so I'd better say it before Kinomi sue me for everything I've got. I don't own Silent Hill (sadly). This is my first attempt at a fan fiction so comments & criticism would help. Updates may be infrequent as I'm a very s   l    o    w type, so bear with me.

This fic takes place before and during the events of Silent hill 3.

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Chapter 2: Abandoned

As Jobe slowly opened his eyes, he replayed his last few moments of consciences over in his mind. Last thing he could remember was Phil screaming and a sensation of being flung head over heels. A scene of destruction now lay before his eyes. The glass from the windshield was scattered across the road, which was now blocking his door as the car lay on its side. The metal of the door had caved in towards Jobe and the window frame had buckled. He shook his head, sending crystals of glass flying from his spiky hair before talking.

"You ok Phil?"

No answer.

Jobe turned his head, silently praying that his friend hadn't gone flying through the front window when they crashed. What he saw was much worse. The passenger seat was empty but there were dark red stains congealed on the light brown material. There was a handprint, smeared across the door handle and yet more splatters of blood on the dashboard.

"Oh god" Jobe turned his head away, wishing that this was some sort of dream but he knew when he turned back, they would still be there staring starkly back at him. Sure enough, they were. Slowly, he undid the seat belt and he thudded against the side of the car as gravity took over. A wave of nausea ran through him as he began clambering up the up turned car, shuddering as he felt one of his hands land in one of the pools of blood and slowly sinking into it. It felt cold to his touch, meaning that Phil must have left a while ago but Jobe was surprised that someone who had lost so much blood was still alive.

Jobe fumbled with the door handle, trying to ignore the red smears and pushed the door open. After climbing out, he sat on the side of the car and looked around. The fog seemed to have thickend and anything further than five meter away was covered in an impenetrable gray mist. Some of his anxiousness seemed to lift when he didn't find Phil's corps lying next to the veichel but all this fog was kind of unnerving. Trying to ignore the images that flashed through his mind of being hit by a car that didn't see him in time or blindly falling off the edge of the road, Jobe dropped off the car. When he hit the pavement, the noise seemed so alien in his silent surroundings that he became aware of how quiet it was. There was no sound of an on coming car, bird song or even wind blowing through trees.

"PHIL!" He cupped his hands around his mouth but the air was thick and heavy. It seemed to swallow up his words prematurely. He looked up and down the road but there was no answer. There was also no sign of whatever they had hit. Hopefully, it was just a log or some trash someone left in the middle of the road. Jobe shrugged to himself and made his way down the road but only got a meter or so before he stopped again. There was a long red smear that ran over the tarmac of the road. It looked as though something had been dragged along its surface. Jobe cocked his head as he examined it. Along side the smear, there was a shoe-print that he recognised as the base of Phil's trainer. The blood had long since dried but how far could a guy with a busted leg get? Job continued down the street, almost missing a huge road sign through the fog.

"_Welcome to Silent Hill, population:     "_

He squinted as he tried to make out the rest of the billboard but some one had graffiti over it. The red paint made a circle, with three smaller one's inside and had dripped over most of the sign. At least it was more tasteful than some of the tags he'd seen back home, but there was something almost occult about it that made him shiver. He turned into the road that ran past it and entered the town, following the occasional drag marks.

The town seamed to be deserted. Jobe saw no one walking the streets and cars seemed to have been left to rust in the fog. There were no lights on in any of the grimy looking houses, all of which looked run down as paint peeled from their walls.

_"What a dump, no wonder Phil didn't want to stop here."_

His best bet would probably be to go up too one of the houses and ask if anyone had seen a guy covered in blood limping round town. Not to hard to miss.

The gate creaked ominously as Jobe pushed it open and stepped in to one of the house's front gardens. Patches of soil were visible through the spars patches of limp, brown grass. He carefully stepped over an abandoned tricycle that lay up turned on the path, not wanting to disturb it from the blanket of weeds that seemed to be smothering it. Jobe climbed the steps up to the porch and tentivly pressed the doorbell. No sound seemed to come from inside the house as Jobe strained his hearing to pick up the electronic chime. He frowned and tried again, to no avail_." Maybe there was a power cut?"_ Jobe thought to himself as he raised a hand to knock on the peeling door but at the slightest push, it swung freely open.

Jobe's hand hovered in the air for a moment as he debated weather to enter the house or not.

"Hello?"

No reply came from within the house. He sucked air sharply through his teeth as he entered. This felt wrong, like singing Christmas Carols at a funeral but he couldn't resist. The bare wooden floor groaned under Jobe's feet and in the dim light, he could barely make out garish green wallpaper that lined the short hallway. There were three ways to go. In front of Jobe, a decrepit looking stair way lead up into the upper parts of the house. On his right was closed door and on his left was another room, partially visible through it's a jarred door_._

"Let's try door number one…" His hand went to door on the right but it found nothing but the door's smooth surface. Jobe peered through dark but couldn't seem to find a doorknob.

"What the…" in it's place there was only a metal bump where the knob should have been. As Jobe turned away, something glistened in the dark and caught his eye. He bent down to examine whatever it was hidden in the shadows, exploring the area under the door with his hands. They found a cold, round object and several small long ones. Bringing his find into the light, Jobe saw that it was the doorknob and several rusty nails. Some one must have unscrewed it. Still looking at his find, he made his way into the other room.

Gray light filtered in through the decomposing curtains, illuminating the small specks of dust could be seen floating through the air. Jobe entered the kitchen, squinting as he tried to make out…well anything. A wooden table stood in the center of the room, surrounded by chairs. In the far corner, there was a work surface with a sink and other appliances. As his eyes adjusted to the (lack of) light he noticed that there was something slumped over the table, too solid to be a discarded item of clothing. As Jobe stepped past the table, his feet slapped against the cheap, raised linioum flooring. Slowly, he put a hand out to draw the curtains and hopefully let some more light in. Yet more dust began to circulate the room when he sharply yanked them back.

_"Damn fog's still there" _he mumbled to himself. Sighing heavily, he turned back but paused for a moment as he tried comprehending what was before him. It was a person, sitting slumped over the table.  The wood near its head was stained a much deeper shade of brown than the rest of the wood, as if something had been spilled on it. Both hands were lying across the table and one was clutching a small, black object. It was at this point, Jobe relised that the man wasn't breathing, let alone moving. Cautiously, he approached the corps.

"My god…"

The mans hand was tightly gripping a small pistol that glinted wickedly in the light. Looking up to the opposite wall, Jobe saw that the walls had been splattered with the man's blood. No prizes for guessing what had happened here.

"_How can I be so cold?" _Jobe quickly silenced the thought and noticed the deceased's other hand was also clutching something. Curiosity over came him and gingerly, he plucked what appeared to be a piece of paper from the dead man's hand. Uncrumpling it, he began to silently read it to himself.

I don't know what's happened, this world's deteriorating And becoming something…dark. I must repent for what I have done For that is what they tell me. To the poor soul who finds themselves here 

_Run, run, run but I doubt it will be fast enough._

_Do what I did and escape this nightmare as fast as you can._

Jobe raised his eyebrow at the suicide note. Scanning down the page, he noticed more writing.

_The first door to Paradise will open when the earth is at three, casting a dark shadow over the moon._

This was even more confusing than the letter. Jobe glanced at the man, and silently questioned his sanity before scrunching up the letter and throwing it into a dark recess of the room.

What the hell was he thinking? Before him lay some poor sod who couldn't cope. Jobe felt sick due to the lack of emotions he felt as he looked at the dead man. In his rush to get out of the room, Jobe knocked the table. As he steadied himself, something thudded on the floor. Once again, curiosity over came him and knelt on the floor to investigate whatever had landed on it. Under the table, Jobe saw a screwdriver rolling away from him, coming to a stop against the dead man's heavy shoe. Jobe was about to leave it but then the memory of the unscrewed doorknob came back to him. Quickly grabbing it, he returned to the door and began working away at fixing it. He was surprised that the doorknob worked, he'd never been any good at D.I.Y. A thin beam of light fell onto the dank hall way as the door opened with a jerk, due to heavy layers of rust that had grown like cancer around the hinges. Looking round the room, Jobe saw the light source was a small pocket torch that lay abandoned on a dusty table, it's piercing beam cut through the darkness. Jobe entered what seemed to be a living room and picked up the torch, sending countless particles of dust dancing through the air.

"If there is a power cut, then this could come in handy" 

Jobe's head snapped up and looked to the widow that dominated the wall. He swore that he saw someone walk past. He practically threw himself against the glass trying to catch a glimpse of whoever it was. Through the fog, a shadow disappeared around the corner of the house. Pocketing the torch, Jobe charged out of the house and threw himself down the steps, landing with a hollow 'thud'. Following the shadow, he came to the small ally that ran between the house and it's neighbor.

"Hello?"

Rubbish bags were stacked against the walls, some had split open and their content has spilled over the ground. Also leaning against the wall were planks of wood. The smell of damp slowly defused from the darkness causing Jobe's nose to wrinkle when the odor invaded his nostrils.

"Hello?" At this, something shifted in the shadows.

Del Le da da, del Le da da, del le da da da

Jobe jumped at the sound of the mobile's piercing ring. He fished the phone out of his pocket as it continued to belt out the nokia theme and put the phone to his ear.

"Hel_" The phone continued to ring. Jobe pressed the answer button again but this didn't stop the electronic bleeping. Looking up from the phone, Jobe saw something slowly rise from the garbage. Jobe was about to ask if they had seen Phil but was cut short as it let out a low rattling moan, as though it had way too much phlegm stuck in it's throat. 

"Are you ok?"

Jobe stepped closer, trying to get a better look at the person but couldn't make out the figure through the darkness. Taking the flash light from his pocket, he pointed it down the ally and clicked it on, almost dropping it when his eyes took in the sight before him. 

The first thing Jobe notice was the 'person's' unnatural posture. One shoulder was raised high and seemed to be connected to where it's ear should have been. The other was hanging unnaturally low, and it looked as though a layer of skin had groan over it, trapping it to its side. The fingers on this hand were moving with spasmodic movements, madly snatching at the air. The thing's skin hung in folds, blood caked almost every inch of it and turned it a rusty colour. Its featureless face stared blankly at Jobe. It's head looked as though someone had taken a crowbar to it and smashed it like a piñata. 

The thing took a step towards Jobe, dragging its oddly bent leg behind the other. Its head had begun to twitch violently as it drew closer.

For a moment, Jobe wasn't able to take his eyes off the walking monstrosity. The phone in his hand had started to ring even louder and was now vibrating. Jobe took a step back as the thing slumped even closer and a new smell filled the air like that of rotting meat.

"What the fuc_"

The thing launched it's self at Jobe with a speed that shouldn't have been possible looking at it's frail legs. With an 'ump', the two slammed into wall. There was a ripping noise as the thing's face began to split, a thin rip forming where it's mouth should have been. Fortunaly, Jobe's self preservation instincts kicked in. Drawing his legs up, Jobe pushed the now salivating monstrosity off with a harsh kick. The thing hit the opposite wall with a wet sound, knocking over the collection of wooden planks that had been piled there.

Jobe wanted to scream and run like hell but the thing lay splayed out, blocking his only escape. The thing shuddered as it slowly started to stumble to its feet. Jobe's eyes darted over the ally in a search of something to defend himself with. Grapping one of the planks, he held it in both hands as smashed it over the thing's head. The plank snapped in two on impact and the thing was now shakily rising to its feet, a rattling noise emitted from its throat. It now had Jobe pined in against the wall, it's rough surface offering him no protection. The walking corps made to leap at it's pray again. With a roar, Jobe rammed the now broken two by four into the thing's stomach. The splintered, jagged edges easily cut through its decaying skin and it let out a scream that sounded like nails being dragged down a chalkboard. Jobe stared at horror as the thing writhed in pain before his face contorted into one of determination. He grunted as he rammed the thing against the wall and the plank cut a few inches deeper. Black blood began oozing down the plank as it reemerged from the thing's back. The scream faded to a gurgle and that too died as the creature slumped over the plank. Jobe let go of the plank and the thing fell to the ground. The phone's ringing came to an abrupt halt as a pool of thick blood formed around the thing's form. 


	3. The woman in black

Wow, feed back! Thanks to all those who have reviewed and I'd better stop before I find myself making an Oscar style speech. Still, I don't own Silent Hill but I do own Jobe so take that Kinomi!

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Chapter 3: The woman in black

Jobe stared at the thing and thought that he was going to be sick. What the hell was it? Jobe tried to silence the voice in his head, which screamed 'monster'. After all, monsters don't exist but Jobe wasn't sure as he looked at it.

_"Oh god, I've killed someone"_

The thought suddenly flashed threw his mind. He looked at the plank that stuck out of its body and turned away in disgust. Walking out of the ally, hundreds of other ideas began to buzz around the inside of his skull. _What if there are more of these things out there? What's happened to all the people in this town? Is Phil even still alive?_

Jobe found him self out on the street when he remembered the phone. It had been ringing so there must be reseption in this town. He could call someone to pick him up from this godforsaken place. He took the phone from his pocket but it was only after he'd started typing in numbers, he noticed the lack of reception bars. After several minuets of fruitlessly waving it in the air he still couldn't find any. Jobe let out a frustrated grunt before putting it back in his pocket.

_"What now?" _Best course of action would be to wait by the roadside for a car to come along and hitch a lift to the nearest town.

_"What about Phil"_ The little voice nagged. Jobe sighed before turning away from the road that led out of Silent Hill and to salvation, instead headed further into the town.

*    *     *

Jobe shivered as he walked briskly down the street. It seemed abnormally cold for late August, feeling more as though it was cold enough for hell to freeze over. There was still no sign of human life but at least he hadn't bumped into anymore of those 'things'.

A bark cut through the silence that Jobe had grown accustomed to. It sounded almost like a dog. Jobe quickened his pace towards the source of the sound, curious to see what it was.

_"Curiosity killed the cat" _That little voice was really starting to get on his nerves.

"Yeh?" He asked himself. "Well I ain't a cat so screw you!" that told him. Jobe smiled at the small victory over his conscience but the smile quickly faded when he became aware of a low growl resonating through the crisp air. Two dark forms loomed out of the mist. Jobe stepped closer to get a better look. The two dogs were fighting over something, both holding part of the prized possession in their mouths. There was a rip as it gave into the building tension and tore a little more. But there was something wrong with the hounds. Bandage like material hung from their bodies and there bare flesh could be seen between its wraps. The heads of the dogs were also covered in the loose hanging material. Jobe gasped as he saw their heads split open vertically, reveling numerous rows of razor shape fangs as they barked at each other. Immediately, Jobe wished he'd listened to the small voice that seemed to be screaming _I TOLD YOU SO!_ Jobe stepped away and prayed that the dogs wouldn't notice him.

The sharp nokia theme tune blasted itself from Jobe's pocket, shattering the silence like a brick through a glass window.

The dog's heads snapped up from whatever they'd been fighting over, letting it drop limply to the ground and locked on to Jobe. They watched him intently for a few moments before charging towards him. Jobe didn't need the little voice to tell him to run and sped off as fast as his legs could carry him. Behind him, he could hear the sharp claws of the mutts skitter over the pavement, every second, they got louder and louder. Jobe knew he couldn't out run them and already, his chest was beginning to burn. The dogs let out a volley of sharp barks as they saw their quarry beginning to tier in anticipation of ripping Jobe limb from limb. He jumped up onto the pavement as one of them lunged past him, tearing at the back of his shirt. Jobe yelped in pain, stumbling, almost tripping but managed to keep his balance as he tore along the pavement. He sent rubbish bins crashing behind him in an attempt to slow his demonic pursuers. The first smashed head fist into it, scattering its contents over the road while the second cleared the metallic can with surprising grace. Jobe saw the chain link fence and grabbed it with one hand, bringing himself crashing into it. Quickly, Jobe pulled him self up it and dropped down harmlessly on the other side as the dog raced past. He held his breath until he was sure the thing was far enough away not to hear him. Collapsing on the floor, he panted heavily in a desperate attempt to fight off the burning sensation in his chest. He glared at the phone that lay in his hand. The temptation to smash it against the wall was great. Instead, he just turned it off.

"So, you see them to?"

Jobe didn't mean to scream but the shock the voice caused was enough to make Jobe's heart stop. He glared at the owner of the voice before getting to his feet.

Her hair clung lifelessly to her shoulders. At first, Jobe would have said it was prematurely white but it seemed to have some sort of unidentible colour in it. It seemed to match her pale skin tone, making him wonder if this woman had ever seen sunlight. The blue eyes watched Jobe as he rose to his feet from a thick eyebrow ridge, which seemed void of eyebrows. 

Weird… 

Then he noticed her clothing. The long black dress looked like something someone from the 1910's would wear to a funeral. The high, V-shaped collar seemed stiff enough to slice her neck open and the shapeless dress left a lot to the imagination.

"What do you mean?" Jobe dusted off his shirt.

"The creatures" Jobe let out a small sigh of relief at the answer. At lest he wasn't going crazy and seeing things.

" Well, they're kind of hard to miss" Her expression remained stony at Jobe's pathetic attempt of humor. "Just what the hell are those things, anyway?" 

"They have come to witness the beginning, the re-birth of paradise. As have you." She cocked her head to one side, as if she was examining him. Her brows furrowed as she talked. "But you don't know do you, why you're here…"

"Great, the one person I find is completely insane" 

"Look, the only reason I'm in this god-forsaken hell hole is because my car broke down and I'm looking for my friend." He didn't have time to listen to some albino psycho talking about the second coming of Jesus. He made a move to barge past her.

"He is lost to you." Something in the soft English voice made him pause.

"Whatever. I'm getting out of here, if you want to stay, that's you're problem." The thirty-something woman stepped in front of Jobe, blocking his way and looked up at him. He could feel the harsh blue eyes boring into him, as if he was as transparent as tissue paper.

"You can't leave, God has chosen you. He has witnessed you're actions and deemed you worthy of the privilege_"

Something in Jobe snapped. His hand snatched out and locked around her thin arm.

"Listen, lady" He talked through gritted teeth "I don't have time for this bull-shit. I've got to find my …"

As Jobe was talking, the woman's face began to harden into a scowl. Jobe trailed off as he noticed a thin scream hanging in the air. It didn't stop, instead, it grew louder and louder. He put his hand to his ear in an attempt to block it out but it seemed as though it was coming from inside his head. It felt as though rusty nails were being dragged over the inside of his skull, racking over his brain. Jobe let out a low moan as he fell to the ground.

Words began circling inside his head, each one bringing a fresh wave of stabbing pain to his temples.

Lust 

 The woman in black effortlessly shook the hand that was now clinging to her in support, off.

Envy

 Even though the piercing scream seemed loud enough to block out all other sound, Jobe could still hear her talk.

Greed

"You will remember, eventually, and embrace God with open arms."

Vanity

 She wore a thin smile and closed her eyes.

Gluttony

 Behind her, the small ally seemed to be consumed by shadow as darkness crept towards Jobe.

Sloth

 Something rose behind the woman.

Wrath

 Jobe struggled to focus his eyes as the scream reached a defining volume. 

Sin

The thing looked at Jobe, grinning at him with vicious white teeth that seemed frozen in a permanent sneer.

Lust Envy Greed Vanity Gluttony Sloth Wrath

 Long horns extended from the back of its goat-like head and thin fur covered its body. 

LustEnvyGreedVanityGluttonySlothWrath

Tattered wings rose up from it's back, stretching out and brushing against the sides of the narrow ally.

SINSINSINSINSINSINSINSINSINSINSINSIN

 Long, bony fingers closed round the woman's arm as the wings began to fold in around them, encasing Jobe in darkness.

SINNNNNNNNNNNNNnnnnnn

*  *  *

"Oomph"

Jobe felt the wind rush out of him as he slammed into the carpeted floor. His eyes rolled wildly in their sockets as he forced the air back into his lungs.

"Where the hell am I?" Of course, there was no one to answer the question as Jobe found himself totally alone in the hallway, a thick smell of damp was coming from the walls. As Jobe's eyes grew accustomed to the dim light, he saw that the wallpaper was peeling from the walls and was raised in bubbles of air. A row of doors lined each walls, and small, brass numbers could be seen on them.

_A hotel?_

  The carpet beneath his feet was stained so badly that you'd probably have more luck guessing what colour it originally was than by inspecting it. Jobe felt his heart hammer in his chest as his eyes raced over the long hallway that ended in darkness. There was something hiding in the shadows, watching Jobe with unblinking eyes. Slowly he got up, never taking his eyes off the dark shape, listening to its rasping breath as it breathed in and out. His hand reached out to the doorknob on the closest door but it refused to budge as his sweaty palms tried to twist it. Gulping, he looked back down the hallway as one of the grimy overhead lights flickered. Whatever it was shifted in excitement as the bulb faded, incasing more of the hallway in darkness. Jobe felt a wave of nausea clench his stomach as the sound of its naked feet padding on the carpet reached his ears. It stopped short of the beam of light that barely illuminated the corridor and waited. It had all the time in the world, unlike Jobe. He stepped back, causing the rotten floorboards to creak as they bent under the pressure Jobe put on them. Another of the bulbs that separated him from the darkness began to flicker, accompanied by the sound of the things heavy breathing, which was now much faster than before. Jobe silently prayed that the light bulb wouldn't go

"Please don't, please…" 

There was a click as the light went out, bringing the darkness ever closer to Jobe as he wheeled round and ran. Behind him, he heard the sound of the next bulb clicking out and the slow shuffling of its feet as it dragged them over the carpet.

'Click'

The shuffling turned into a thudding as it began to move faster. Jobe glanced over his shoulder, not really knowing if he wanted to see his pursuer. There were only three lights between him and it. As it entered the light, the bulb clicked off, allowing Jobe a mere glimpse of whatever it was. He ran even faster as he heard the next bulb blink out. It began to pant as the invisible thing loped after Jobe; the sound of each footstep grew nearer and nearer, as it's tireless pace increased. The end of the corridor loomed into sight as Jobe forced his legs to move faster. The bulb above his head cracked as it shattered into a million pieces, showering Jobe with the tiny shards of glass. They cut into his naked neck as he ran headlong for the door that waited for him at the end of the hallway. He barely registered the number on the door, 312, as he smashed into it and nearly tore the door from its hinges. He flew into the dark room and slammed the door shut behind him as the final light clicked off and the entire corridor submitted to the dark.    __


	4. Dreams of ghosts & Room 312

Bad news, people. I'm back to school and have exams coming up so I won't have as much time to work on this.

Wow, it's an honor to see so many notorious writers reading this story. You're reviews and comments are welcome and appreciated but before we go any further, I must apologies again. This chapter was written at 2 o'clock in the morning whist my blood stream was flowing with a dangerously high quantity of irn-bru & coke. As you can see, it just spiraled out of control. BTW, this is a dream, hence the weirdness.

And Hello Captain? I totally agree with you're views on Claudia, who interestingly enough wasn't originally going to be in this. Then I played SH3, relised there was a huge hole in my story and had to add her, not that I'm upset or anything.

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Chapter 4: Dreams of ghosts and room 312

She looked down on the writhing figure at her feet, an expression of vague amusement on her face. It was a shame he had to go through all this, but it was the only way he would see. _"Yes, the end will justify the means"_ She nodded to her self, as if reassuring that the statement was right, even though she felt a pang of guilt for having to cause Jobe all this pain. _"But it is necessary"._ It would be the only way that he could accept what he truly was, and that was essential. After all, the others had all had to go through this… She turned and walked away from Jobe as he let out a low moan, twitching spasmodically. She whished she could stay but time was of the essence. The Chosen One had been located and the woman in black was looking forward to seeing an old friend again. A thin smile spread across Claudia's face as she walked up the ally and was swallowed up by the fog. *   *   * 

Jobe slammed his back against the door, clenching his eye's shut and praying that whatever it was in the hall way wouldn't smash through the door. He could hear the blood rushing through his head as he waited for it to slam into the wooden barricade. It never did.

Jobe slowly opened his eyes after what felt like an hour and gasped. Wherever he was, it sure as hell wasn't a hotel room. From the antiseptic aroma that filled his nose, he guessed he was in a hospital. In the center of the small tiled room was a table. As his eye's adjusted, he noticed three people were sat around it; well one was sitting crossed legged on the table itself. Shoulder length black hair covered most of her face as she stared down at her arms. The sleeve of the bulky, white polo neck was pulled up as she stared at her skin. Sluggishly, she picked up a knife that lie next to her and slowly cut at the exposed flesh.

"Don't do that." Another, a nurse, said. Her hair seemed almost red as it lay around her shoulders, matching the uniform she wore. The girl on the table let out a short laugh as she watched the blood trickle down her arm.

"Why bother telling her, Lisa? She ain't going to stop and it doesn't do her any harm."

Saying the owner of the voice was over weight would be a compliment. The fat man looked up from the pizza box that lay before him and stared at the nurse. A small blue baseball cap covered up his dirty blond hair. Lisa looked at him as if he were an imbecile.

"You think it's okay to let her do that?" She snapped sharply. The man submissively returned his gaze to the pizza box, attempting to hide behind the thin card box lid. 

The girl's head shot up, as if she'd heard something and let her dark eye's rest on Jobe.

"Another one…" She mumbled, her voice sounded thick with lethargy. The man popped out from behind the pizza box and peered at Jobe with his tiny eye's that seemed too far apart.

"Heh, wonder what he's done to get here." A fat grin began to seep across his face, earning him a glare from Lisa.

"Don't scare him, Eddie." She whispered in a low tone. Jobe felt as though they were examining him like a piece of meat, just waiting to prod him.

"Just where is 'here'." He asked, trying not to sound like a complete idiot. The girl on the table looked at him sideways, as if considering the question.

"Nowhere" A voice to the side of him muttered, causing Jobe's head to spin. Eddie burst into a fit of hysterics as though this was the funniest thing he'd ever heard. The side of the room slunk into darkness, letting the bars of the cage highlight themselves through the light that seeped through. As his eye's adjusted, he could make out a woman sitting on a chair, watching him as he approached the bars from the shadows.

"Nowhere?" Jobe asked as he let a hand rest on one of the smooth polished bars.

"Well, technically you're in a small resort town called Silent Hill but…" The woman left the sentence hanging as she lent against the bars, allowing the folds of her red cardigan to ooze between the metal poles. She flashed a provocative smile at Jobe as he stared at her. "…This town isn't exactly normal."

Jobe felt his lip twitch.

"How's that meant to help me?" His hand smacked against the bar, letting it's metallic voice sing out across the room. The woman merely folded her arms as Jobe began ranting. "I wake up and get attacked by god-knows-what, find my self in a hotel that leads into a hospital and you're telling me that this place isn't normal." He breathed through his teeth and turned away, glaring at the group sitting round the table. Why could no one just give him a straight answer?  
He made a move for the door when they began talking in hushed voices.

"Maybe he's not like us, ya know?" Eddie let the slice of pizza hover in front of his mouth as he talked before ramming as much of the greasy morsel into his mouth as possible.

"Maybe," He continued through a mouthful of food. "This guys gonna get outta here like James."

The knife girl kept her eyes on Jobe as she spoke with a tone of boredom.

"No, he's gone to far to leave."

 Jobe turned on them again, not totally believing they were discussing their opinions right in front of him. There was a snort from the cage. 

"Oh please" The woman scolded from the shadows as she lent against the wall. "People don't just end up here, this place calls them to it, feeding off_"

Lisa shot up from the chair, causing the wooden seat to skitter across the tiled floor. Her fist's pounded of its surface, causing the knife girl to flinch.

"God damn it, Maria, not everyone in the world is guilty of heinous crimes!"

_"What is she trying to protect me from?" _Jobe asked himself as he watched the flesh around Lisa's knuckles turn white as the fists clenched. Maria slowly pushed herself up from the wall, keeping her eye's fixed firmly on the fiery nurse's.

"And you're so perfect, so free of sin?" She placed her hands together, as if praying. "Last time I checked, you were so addicted to White Claudia that you let it control every decision you made. You abandoned that child on a road side, leaving it to die." Maria smiled triumphantly to herself, mocking Lisa with every word.

Jobe didn't have a clue what was going on but it was obvious that these two weren't the best of friends. He noticed Eddie and the girl slowly back away from the fuming nurse towards him. They had good reason because then Lisa exploded.

"You tramp, how dare you judge me." She stomped over to the cadge and probably would have torn Maria apart if the bars weren't in the way. "At lest I'm real, you freak!"

For a moment, Maria just stared at Lisa as she panted, trying to recompose herself after the sudden outburst.

"Real?" The dirty blonde's face had darkened and Jobe swore the room behind her was sinking into shadows. He glanced quickly at the two beside him but they seemed transfixed on the confrontation. As he turned back, the air in the room seemed to grow heavier with every breath and some unpleasant odor hung in the ether. The colour had seemed to drain from Maria's face, leaving it a shade of gray that no living thing should go. The cell around her was defiantly darkening; the lines between the tiles grew thick and black. Thin red lines began to criss cross themselves over the floor, smothering it in an insane patchwork of something that looked suspiciously like blood.

"You can talk, you're just a figment of that girls imagination." Her voice sank lower and lower, becoming more distorted with each syllable. A thin layer of skin began to slowly creep over her cloths, spreading like some disease as it covered her in a pale white membrane. Jobe felt his back brush against the wall as he tried to put as much distance between him and the rotting woman. The veins of blood began creeping towards him, moving erratically like cracks forming in glass.

He had to get out of this room. Now.

"You were just ssomee puupeeet usssed bbby Aaleesssssa ttttoo ppprrolonnnnng heerr suuurvvvivvalllll"

Maria's head hung limply as she trailed off into a hiss before she let it flop back, dead hair fell over her face in thick strands. As Jobe's hand fumbled with the doorknob, he saw her mouth open wide, wider than it should have been able. A second passed before the ear splitting scream worked its way into his skull, resembling someone skewing a pig. Jobe shut his eyes, trying to block out the sound as he felt the door click open and he fell out of the room that slammed shut behind him, cutting off the scream as it reached a defining volume.

It took a moment for Jobe to reliys that he 'd just entered the corridor.

"Shit"

He leapt to his feet, expecting to come face to face with his demonic persuader but was instead met by a completely different scene.

Rows of benches faced him; their stiff backs did nothing to entice you to sit on them. That and the fact that they were covered in a whole variety of stains and scratch marks, as though some giant cat had raked its claws along the wood. It almost reminded him of a church. Rust caked the floor and walls in thick layers, rotting away at the beams that held up the ceiling. Jobe eyes widened as he saw the whole structure was writhing, the bricks bucked and heaved as they squirmed across the ceiling like an army of maggots. Something else crawled over its surface with static movements. The man like thing looked at Jobe, The flesh that covered its body was completely raw. It smiled maliciously with the only feature visible on it's twitching head. The flesh between its legs seemed to have grown across forming a web between the two appendages. It hissed as it let one of its thin arms fall and pointed with its two sharp fingers at something behind Jobe. Reluctantly, Jobe took his eyes off the grinning freak and turned around to where an alter should have been. Instead, there was a huge gapping hole in the floor and…

"You!"

It was that woman from the ally but she didn't seem to hear Jobe's cry. Instead, she continued to stare forwards with those dead eyes of hers. She still didn't seem to notice him as he walked up to her, still shouting.

"What the hell did you do to me? One minute, everything's relatively normal and then I find my self in some sort of psychotic fun house. And that thing in the ally, those dogs, what were they?"

Still she looked past him.

"Can you even see me?" He snapped his fingers in front of her face, not really knowing if he wanted a response. There was none anyway.

Yet again, Jobe gave into temptation and glimpsed behind him and almost had a heart attack when he saw the gun aimed at his chest. He gave a yell and dived behind one of the rotting pillars. Realizing that no shots had been fired, Jobe looked out from his hiding place and took a look at the gunman.

Make that woman.

Short black hair hung around her head, barely reaching her shoulders. Her face was warped into a mask of utter hatred as she held the gun pointed squarely at the woman in black. Jobe noticed in her other hand was what looked like a long metal pole that hung limply against her leg. The woman in black didn't seem at all worried about this, though. In fact she was smiling.

"Alessa!"

'Alessa' didn't seem to be as happy to see her.

"Why?" She flickered for a moment like bad reseption on a television.

"You know very well, it's the only way to bring forth the rebirth of Paradise."

_'Geez, that tune was getting old_._'_

 Alessa shook her head, flickering again.

"No, how could something good come from so much death and pain?" Her voice trailed of as the flickering increased and gradually, she began to change into someone else. While her body remained the same, the blue dress she wore melted into a green skirt and a white sleeveless jacket. Her hair was shorter and a vibrant shade of blond but the look of malice was still on her face.

"You bitch, GO TO HELL!" the girl who replaced Alessa screamed, pointing the gun at the woman.

Something rumbled in the hole behind her. With a scream, some hideous miscarriage of god's creation burst out of the hole's black depth, landing in front of the white haired woman. Its hand ended in a series of sharp long claws that slipped out from it's decomposed skin. It's fist smacked into the woman's body and soundlessly, she doubled over as the cruel claw tore its way out her back. With a look of disbelief, she raised her head and stared into the piercing green eyes of the monster, making a small chocking sound as a line of blood slowly crept from her mouth over her skin, staining it like snow.

"Envy…."

It ripped the claw from her stomach, letting her fall limply to the ground. It stared at wonder at its now red stained talon. Jobe felt his head pound as he resisted the urge to throw up. Everything seemed to blur as he fell to the ground as a familiar scream filled his ears.   


	5. A twisted angel

Oh joy, a short chapter! Thank you for the reviews and I'm glad you all seem to be enjoying this.

I appologise for the grammatical mistakes but I suffer from dyslexia and my spell checkers just as bad as I am. I will try to fix them though.

Chapter 5: A twisted angel

Jobe's eyes slowly fluttered open. Clutching his head, he groaned as he rose. He almost smiled when he realized he was in that dingy little ally he'd fallen unconscious in.

_'No sign of the Jehovah witness from hell, either!'_

This was almost too good to be true. He rubbed his eyes, letting his mind run over that nightmare, if you could call it that. It was so vivid; he could have sworn he'd been there. He let out a laugh at how foolish he'd been, after all, nothing like that could ever happen.

The laugh was cut short when Jobe saw what lay before him and felt his stomach clench.

Where Alessa had stood in the dream was a gigantic burn mark, sprawling over the gravel. Jobe just stared at the black stain; not wanting to believe it was there. It hadn't before. Something glinted at him from the scorched ground and unwillingly, he found him self draw to it.

A rusty steel pipe lay harmlessly on the ground but it was way to familiar for Jobe. He'd seen it only moments before, in the hands of a screaming girl.

'But none of that really happened…' 

Even the voice of reason was beginning to doubt this. After all, in a town where the dead walked and all the citizens had disappeared, how could you call the appearance of a metal pole odd? With the memory of those dogs fresh in his mind, he quickly snatched the pole from the ground, not wanting his hand to linger near that black mark for too long. There was something else concealed in the darkness. Jobe felt even more uncomfortable when he saw the handgun winking up at him.

He'd never liked guns when he was younger, his father had had one and kept it hidden up in the closet under the towels but Jobe knew it was there. One time his brother took it out, taunting Jobe with it. Jobe had begged him to out it back but his brother merely laughed in his face before racing outside. He was only going to look at it, that's all…  

He shot their neighbor's dog by accident. Jobe could remember screaming at his brother while he just stared at the animal that lay motionless at his feet.

Jobe didn't want to but still he took the small firearm, it would probably do more good than the metal pole he held in his other hand. For a minuet, he fumbled with the small weapon before the chamber came off. It was empty, Jobe didn't know if this was a good or bad thing.

Stuffing the weapon into his pocket, Jobe hurried out of the ally and back onto the main street. Still the fog swirled around him in thick clouds, obscuring anything further than a few meters away in a gray veil.

"What now?" He asked the empty air. If he was going to find Phil, he'd need to know where he was going. Didn't he pass a general store on his way into town? They may have had maps there and maybe he'd be able to pick up some ammunition for this gun. Carefully, he slowly made his way down the road, listening out for the padding of clawed feet behind him but the only sound to accompany him was his own footfall. 

His foot went down but found nothing. Jobe yelled as his foot sank into the mist, threatening to pull him down as well. With his other foot, he sent himself flying back onto the gravel. For a moment he stood frozen to the spot staring at the road ahead of him. It ended sharply, as if some giant had ripped a huge chunk out. Tentivly, Jobe peeked over the edge, watching as the jagged side ran down into the fog, the occasional pipe jarring out like fractured bones.

"But I just walked down here! That's impossible!"

The gapping chasm just stared back at him. Even if he wanted to leave, he couldn't.

Well, if he was going to get to that shop, he wasn't going to go this way. Jobe turned around but almost fell to the ground. Searing pain rushed to his head, completely crippling him. He shut his eyes, trying to block it out. As quickly as it had come, it was gone. Jobe cautiously opened his eyes.

"Not again."

He found himself kneeling in a small room. There was something lying in front of him, a long knife, stained red. Jobe looked away in disgust from the bloody knife but then he saw the walls. The word 'wrath' was scrawled allover it in furious, large messy writing. He was aware that he wasn't the only person in the room, there was a figure sitting in the corner, concealed by shadow. Jobe began to back away as it lifted up its head and watched him from red eyes. It dragged itself to its feet watching Jobe with an unhealthy interest. Even though he couldn't really make it out from the shadow, he could tell that this human shadow was something more than that thing in the ally. Jobe's back touched the wall; there was no way he was getting out of here. His eyes quickly scanned the room but there was no door or windows.

He could see the things leg's tense before it lunged straight at him, he screamed as he desperately tried to get out of the way of it's out starched, eager fingers.  

"ARRRGH!" He sat bolt upright, panting. He was alone again, surrounded by fog. 

'What the hell was that, another of those dreams?' 

Jobe just sat there with his eyes wide open, trying to make sense of it all.

Wrath 

The word seemed burned into his mind. Did it mean something important? Jobe's head snapped up.

He'd have to put that aside for now. He swore he heard something. There it was again, a slow beat. His eyes scanned the road in front of him but he couldn't see a thing. It was becoming louder now, set to a rhythmical tempo. Jobe felt his fingers tighten around the handle of the gun that rested in his pocket as sweat began building up on his forehead.

 It sounded so close, how come he couldn't see it?

_'Wait a minuet'_ The sound wasn't In front of Jobe, it was…

He looked up, bringing the gun up with him as he pointed the pistol at the beast swooping down from the fog.

'Click'

He pulled the trigger but nothing happened. If Jobe had the luxury of time, he would have kicked himself for forgetting there were no bullets in the gun.

The huge flesh/brown blur smacked into Jobe, throwing him off his feet and sent him sailing over the edge of the abyss. He felt the air rush past him as the gapping hole swallowed him up. The last thing he saw was his attacker fly overhead, its flayed wings stretched out.

And then it was gone; everything went black as the twisted angel disappeared into the fog 

 


	6. The first circle of hell

Well kudos to hello captain for reviewing every chapter, and seeing as she asked so nicely, here's chapter 6. I'm glad to see most people are enjoying this rather macabre tale and as always, you're reviews are appreciated.

BTW, I read over the last chapter and I just want to say that I wasn't making any references to myself incase people thought I was being big headed.

Chapter 6: The first circle of hell

Jobe let out a groan as the world around him slowly shifted into focus. This was the third time he'd been knocked unconscious today. Pondering if this could cause brain damage, he got to his feet and looked up. 

The fog was more like a low cloud as it hung over his head. The side of the great ravine could only be traced for a few meters before, like everything else here, it was swallowed like the fog. Jobe scooped up the metal pole, tucking it into his belt before sinking his hands into the walls sides. There was no way he was just going to stay here and rot.

Jobe's hand seemed to dig into the soil like surface more like dry sand than earth. With his other hand, he reached out and grabbed onto the slice of rock that jutted from the edge. He balanced his feet on a pipe and reached for another piece of rock to pull him up with.

"Just…a…little…further." He stretched his arm out as far as he could to the point it felt like his fingers were going to pop put their sockets. He wasn't going to be defeated by a big hole. He shot his arm out again.

"Gottcha!" He grinned triumphantly as he felt his digests lock around it. Now all he had to do was pull he up and grab onto the next ledge.

SHLOOP

Jobe's face cracked as the rock seemed to crumble into grit in his hand. He felt himself tumble backwards and could do nothing to stop it but desperately clawed the air for something to hold onto. But of course, there was nothing.

His back hit the ground, causing a small cloud of dust to rush out from underneath him. For a moment, Jobe just lay there, a small groan building up in his throat. He leapt up and let the growl explode into a full out roar, flinging the remaining rock at the wall that defied him.

"FUCK!!!" He kicked the earth beneath his feet, sending even more dust into the air.

Why did every thing have to be so hard? Would it have killed Phil to wait in the car for Jobe to wake up?

Jobe let out another shout, scuffing his feet savagely against the ground. He would give anything to be at home with Julia, watching some crap, made for TV movie. This was all that crazy woman's fault. Things had been fairly normal until she showed up.

"_Ghhuurrr…_"

Jobe looked up from the small dent he'd made in the ground with his now extremely dirty shoe. All that anger seemed to defuse through his skin like sweat as a new feeling filled his heart.

Fear.

The other side of the ravine seemed to recede back into darkness as the bottom half had been eroded back like a cave. Water slowly trickled down the wall, dripping from the over hanging edge with a hollow 'pat' as it hit the ground. There was something lurking in that dark recess.

Jobe pulled the metal pole from his belt, slinging it over his shoulder like a baseball player. The noise came again, like a heavy smoker trying to clear their throat of sticky bile. Jobe shifted his feet in agitation as he heard what ever it was wading through the mud. 

"Come on out." Jobe heard the tremble in his voice in this ridicules attempt to assure him self that there was nothing to be afraid of. 

'Why not prove it to you're self, huh? Go on, turn on the flashlight. There's probably nothing there. Just you're overactive imagination going into overdrive.'

He let one hand drop from the comforting grip of the pole and fumbled feverishly for the torch in his chest pocket, clipping it on the front of his shirt. He shut his eyes, praying that the small voice he'd come to hate was right. With a small prayer, he pressed the small button and a beam of light shot from the bulb, illuminating the recess with harsh artificial light.

What stood before him was no figment of his imagination.

The ally-man stood hunched over, like a deer caught in the headlights. It glared at Jobe with that horrible blank face and for a moment, it's writhing fingers lay still as it silently looked Jobe over. A small area of it's damp, decomposing skin glistened in the torchlight as it straitened up.

Somehow, seeing the twisted being before him, the unknown seemed a lot less terrifying.

His hand very quickly locked back onto the pole but it seemed to slip through his fingers as layers of sweat lubricated it.

'shloop'

It pulled it's feet up from the muddy pool, making a sick sucking noise as water rushed to fill the gap. It shuffled closer, it's head started shaking in nervous anticipation. It leapt at him, screaming, and Jobe let the pole fly, bringing it crashing down on it's head. It fell face first into the mud and with out thinking, Jobe stamped down on it's frail neck, forcing it's head even deeper into the mud. The ally-man's legs writhed as it tried to get up but they merely slipped in the mud. It's movements were like some hideous fish flopping about out of water.

It didn't tire as it's movement grew even more frantic. What if these things didn't need oxygen? Jobe looked down at the head that was almost completely submerged in mud, resting his pole against it like a golfer lining up for a shot. He brought it up, over his shoulders and then struck the head with all his might. There was a crack and a muffeled scream bubbled up from the mud. The ally-man gave one final jerk before lying still. 

Jobe sighed, straightening up. Looking down at it, he didn't even bother asking how such a thing was possible. Jobe walked past it into the recess, letting the small beam of light guide him.

He almost missed it at first, for at the back of the alcove was a door, built into the wall of earth. It was covered by so many layers of dirt and rust that it blended right in. Jobe didn't quite believe it was there at first, thinking that he'd finally gone insane after all he'd seen, but he blinked and it was still there.

Jobe waded over to the heavy door, almost snatching the door handle in his eagerness to get out of this hole. It refused to move in his hands. He tried again, almost slicing his hand open as it slipped off the handle.

It almost felt as though something inside him had broken. All that was between him and getting out of here was this door that stubbornly refused to move.

'There's no way I could break this down, either.' He thought to himself as he ran his fingers over it. It felt like it was made out of iron or something and the pole in his now trembling hand wasn't going to do much to it.

His finger stopped as it danced over the door. He re-traced the area that it had just been resting on. Here it was again, that deep grove his fingers had tripped over. Jobe set the pole down and began rubbing furiously at the door. Layers of rust peeled off in his hands, like some serpent shedding it's skin.

He stepped back to admire his work, trying to ignore the stabs of pain that surged through his now raw hands.

'The first door to Paradise'

Well this didn't bode well but that wouldn't stop him from getting the hell out of here. There was some kind of display like the face of a clock beneath the words with carefully drawn numbers around the outside. Instead of hands, there were another two circles drawn within each other.

The memory of the letter he'd found in the house came back to him.

"The first door to Paradise will open when the earth stands at three, casting a dark shadow over the moon…" So what did that mean? He had to sit around and wait for the next lunar eclipse? Jobe walked up to the diagram. In the center of it was a small golden ball, Representing the sun maybe? He scanned the other two circles and sure enough, each had a small ball in them as well. The blue ball in the second ring was probably meant to be the earth while the white one in the outer ring was the moon.

"Great, what now?" he asked himself. He tried to move the middle ring, and for a moment, Jobe though it was going to refuse to budge against the layers of rust that had clogged it up. With a groan, it slipped from it's resting place, allowing Jobe to rotate it into the section that came under 'three'.

So far so good, now all he had to do was the same for the outer ring so that the earth was between the sun and moon. As Jobe rotated the outer ring into position, there was an audible click from within the heavy door. Jobe couldn't help but grin, even if what waited for him on the other side of the door could tear him up like tissue paper.


	7. A lamb to the slaughter: The first inter...

Jobe was starting to get on my nerves so I thought I'd write this little chapter to take a break. I still don't own Silent Hill but I do own ten fingers and an over active imagination so the joke's on them, right?

A lamb to the slaughter: The First Interlude

As Jobe was forcing his way out of the hole, another person was feeling the same sensation of relief. She was glad to be back, after all this church was the closest thing to a home she had. Claudia allowed a small smile to linger on her face as she walked up the isle, letting her toes sink into the deep red carpet. She made her way to the back of the alter, for behind it rested the organ, an ancient instrument that one of the church's previous owners had decided to splurge out on. 

She pulled the old moth-eaten stool out from underneath the organ, where it had been collecting dust for years. More dust coated the long metal tubes that rose up from it's back, and the coating on the lid was so thick that you could write you're name on it. Claudia carefully prized the heavy lid back and for a moment just stared at the ivory keys before pressing one down. The sound it made was tremendous as air tore up the pipes and completely shattered the silence that seemed to flap away like a flock of frightened birds.

She began to play to the audience of saints depicted in the stain glass windows and the rows of unforgiving church benches. Claudia allowed her mind to wonder as Bach's Staccato & Fugue rang out from the dusty pipes with the force of screaming angels. This skill had been the one thing her father had hated to admit she was good at and getting praise from him, no matter how small, was harder than getting blood from a stone. At least now, she was out of his reach and the reach of the children, with their cries of insult like 'Claudia Wolf is

*     *    *

a walking FREAK SHOW!!!'

The pale girl frowned as she looked at the message carved into her locker and shrugged. They'd called her much worse in the past and after Alessa had gone, she'd become used to this kind of thing. After all, every school had one person who was the victim of their peer's wrath.

_'Guess who is that lucky person'_ She slammed the rusting door shut (it was the only way you could close it now since some kid had made a huge dent in it, with Claudia's head) and the metallic clang echoed up and down the deserted hall way. Since fifth grade, she'd opted to wait at least fifteen minuets after the bell had gone to leave the school. Most of the other children couldn't be bothered to wait that long to ambush her on her way home when they knew she'd be at school the next day. That and it meant she wouldn't have to spend a further fifteen minuets at home with her father, even if it meant he would 'teach' her for being late. Claudia shuddered just at the thought of him, his touch, his 'lesson's', his_  
The girl tore herself from the lockers, scooping up the weather-beaten satchel as she left and turned to go down the empty corridor, alone. But then Claudia had always been alone since Alessa 'died' in that fire seven years ago. It probably would have been better if her only friend had died, for now she was kept locked up in that room, deep in the hospital, no more than an empty husk. Claudia had been there a few times even though she knew if her father found out, it would be more than her life was worth. She knew he and the 'order', a higher circle of their religion had something to do with it and it wouldn't be a surprise if they'd engineered the whole thing. After all, it was the heartless kind of thing her father would revel in taking part in.

Out of the corner of her eye, Claudia caught a glimpse of herself in a mirror that hung over a water fountain that had no more purpose than to collect algae in it's metal bowl. She stopped and glared at her reflection with malice. No wonder they'd singled her out as their universal punching bag, she stuck out like a sore thumb.

_'I mean, who's heard of a fourteen year old girl with white hair?'_ And then there was her skin. It made her look like a walking corps, as it was so void of colour, except for the occasional purple bruise. Claudia threw back her head and laughed, something she rarely did. For a moment, she became one of her tormentors and laughed at that pathetic excuse of a teenager who stared back at her. There were of course, darker secrets that the rest of the world didn't know that made her even more of a freak. Claudia saw things the other children couldn't, not even in their wildest dreams. Beneath this world was one that only she could see. A place filled with lurking shadows and never ending darkness, a place Claudia knew was the promised Paradise that the order believed would be returned to them and they could finally live by god's grace.

The girl wiped a tear from her cold blue eyes; still giggling as she walked towards the double doors and threw them open.

The fog hung over the empty grounds as it did every day, masking everything in a gray mist. Claudia hurried down the cement steps and out onto the pavement, maybe she'd take the scenic route home through Rose Water Park seeing as it was such a nice day. 

She'd only just past the school gates before she stopped dead in her tracks as a voice broke through the crisp air.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Claudia sunk her teeth into her lip and debated weather or not to run like hell. No, she'd better not. Last time Claudia tried that, they'd stone her. Letting out a shuddery breath, she turned to face her tormentor.

A group of five boys stared back at her with their hands pocketed in their heavy anoraks. One younger boy stood slightly apart from the group not really looking as though he belonged with all his burly friends.

"Hey freak, I'm talking to you!" The boy she recognised as some kid in her class called Bill Denbrough jeered again. One of his friends stepped up, pulling something from his deep pocket and with a flip of his wrist, a short blade slid from the wooden handle. He waved the switch-blade at Claudia and muttered,

"If she ain't gonna speak, maybe we should make her cry." Some of the boys laughed at the comment as he leisurely threw the blade from hand to hand as if it were no more dangerous than a ball. Claudia felt as though her heart was beating so hard, it would tare itself from her chest. Suddenly, the smile dropped from his face, "Get her." 

She caught a glimpse of them lunging towards her before she turned and ran up the street. She could hear them behind her as their feet beat the pavement, baying like dogs chasing down some small creature. Claudia skidded round the corner of the street, hoping to lose them in the fog. A rock sailed past her head, nipping her ear as it flew past but she didn't feel it. She was too scared; anyway, there would be plenty of others for her to feel. She turned onto another identical street and tore up it with no idea of where she was going, as long as she got away from them. The sound of their footfall was beginning to fade as the distance between her and the horde grew. Maybe she was going to make it, maybe_

A rock smacked into the back of her head, snapping it forward and Claudia lost her footing. She fell face first onto the pavement, her face grating over it's rough surface. For a moment, she just lay there, totally absorbed by the sharp pain that racked her skull.

_'Have to keep moving'_   She opened her eyes and tried to push herself up on grazed hands. Dots swam in front of her eyes but when they cleared, Claudia saw a forest of legs surrounding her.

"You know," Bill slammed his foot down on Claudia's back as she tried to rise. "They had the right idea when they burnt that little witch friend of youre's, leper." The boy pressed his foot down harder as Claudia tried to squirm out from underneath it. He pulled a small silver lighter from his pocket that glinted evilly in the fading light. He bent over and grabbed one of Claudia's pale hand and clicked the lighter open.

"Bill, you don't_" The smaller boy started but was cut off by a vicious glare from Bill.

"If you're going to make a fuss, Vincent, you shouldn't have come!" He snapped and the small mousy boy melted back into the crowd, trying to ignore Claudia's pleading eyes.

Bill held her hand out, twisting it violently so her palm was raised to the sky. He held the lighter underneath it and without batting an eyelid, flipped it on.

Oh lord how it hurt.

Bill held it there, seeming oblivious the screams from the writhing girl and the smell of cooking flesh. Claudia clamped her eyes shut as tears welled up in their corners, praying that this torment would end or they'd grow bored of mutilating her. Finally after what seemed like an eternity, Bill let the lighter drop to the floor, but only because it had run out of gas. He curled his lip at the whimpering girl and sharply planted his foot into the back of her head, forcing it further into the pavement. Claudia felt her lip split open and warm metallic flavor of blood slowly crept into her mouth.

For a moment, Bill watched her spit up blood before turning to his grinning companions.

"Let's finish this, I got homework." 

Instantly, they started kicking at any part of the girl's body that was exposed. Claudia felt the first boot hit her between her shoulder blades but after that, they came as fast and indistinguishable as rainfall.

Finally, they left; leaving a semi conscious Claudia sprawled out on the street in a pool of her own blood.

Her father would surely beat her for being late.

She opened her eyes to find the street was gone, replaced by thin, rusting metal grating that stretched over the unfathomable darkness beneath her. In a matter of seconds, day had turned to night and the buildings around her looked even more decrepit than usual. All around her, she heard the groans of the inhabitants of this forbidden land and smiled. Claudia always enjoyed these small glimpses of Paradise.

*     *     *

The last thing Claudia remembered about that day was that her father had beaten her for getting home late.

'I pity them, for they could never understand. But when they see the Paradise Alessa brings to us, they shall be forgiven for being so naive.'

Well, she was free from them now, and from the grip of her father.

A hand slapped down on her shoulder, causing her to miss a note on the organ's slender keys. She let her fingers drop from the instrument and took a deep breath before looking over  her shoulder. It was a father of a different kind.

"Well, Miss. Wolf, how did you're little excursion go?" He drawled in that southern accent of his. She looked at the stumpy man for a moment before answering.

"The holy one is coming and I believe that we won't have long to wait for the birth of God." The man nodded approvingly and pushed his glasses up his nose.

"And just what did you do to ensure this?"

"Something I am not proud of." Claudia hung her head as the man nodded again. He paced over to the first row of pews and sat down, sprawling out as much as possible.

"How long until her arrival?"

"A day, maybe more…" He slouched even more, resting his arm over the back of the wooden seat.

"We have time to prepare our 'special guests' then?" Claudia frowned slightly before giving an answer.

"We can only pray, Father…"

"Amen to that, Sister Claudia, amen to that."

BTW, there was a reference to a Stephan King novel in there. If you spot it, you can have a cookie *waves cookie in the air*


	8. Greed

Well, Jobe's back and oh joy, people, a new character! 

Chapter 7: Greed

The thick iron door crept open painfully slowly as it shifted through a layer of grime and muck. Even with his full body weight behind it, Jobe had trouble pushing it open. A small trail of water seeped out from the crack, sloping against Jobe's mud caked shoes as he pulled the door as far as it would go. Looking one last time over his shoulder, he bid farewell to the light before squeezing through the crack.

The first thing that hit Jobe was the god-awful smell. It burnt away at the inside of his nostrils like sulpher with a mixture of rot and rancid air before he had a chance to react.

Jobe dropped to his knees, retching dryly as the heavy air smothered him. He erupted into a fit of violent coughing, trying desperately not to pass out. He grabbed his throat as he fell forward, thrusting his other hand out forward to catch himself before he fell face first into the shallow water that surrounded him.

And then the smell was gone. He breathed in deeply, contracting his fingers as he filled his lungs with fresh air. He stopped.

_'What was that?' _The water had also vanished, replaced by something that crinkled underneath his digits.

Jobe opened his eyes and green paper blinked back at him. He sat back on his haunches, staring at the sea of twenty-dollar notes that surrounded him, stretching out forever. With a start, Jobe jumped to his feet as blood began slowly creeping between the creases of the dollar bills, staining them with crimson fingers. Like an open wound, it formed into a deep red pool but this was no ordinary stain for only a few of the bills had become clogged with blood, spelling one word.

GREED

Jobe lurched back and fell on to his back. For a moment, his head went under the foul-smelling water and he felt it trickle into his mouth. His head smacked off something hard and dots blazed across his vision. Even though the water was only knee height, it took him a moment to tear his head from it while the sound of water crashing about him brought him back to reality. The bills were gone and he was surrounded only by darkness. For a moment, the only noises accompanying him were the sounds of his own hurried breathing and water slowly churning about him.

"Was that even real?" The money had felt as real beneath his fingers as the water that now swirled around his body. It seemed more like the vision Jobe had seen before he fell into the hole than the full-blown hallucination with the hospital.

A shiver ran up Jobe's spine and he was beginning to fell that familiar sense of dread creeping up on him. What if these visions were some sort of warning? He'd seen one just before that flying abomination had attacked him. Suddenly, coming into this room didn't seem like such a good idea. Jobe rose to his feet as the heavy, stagnant water clung to his shirt, weighing him down.

Jobe turned to the wall, letting his fingers trace over the wet metal surface as he tried to find the door handle but the impenetrable darkness was doing nothing to ease his already frayed nerves. Something clunked against his chest and he gasped through clenched teeth but the shock quickly gave away to relief. What an idiot he was, how could he have forgotten about the flashlight clipped to the front of his shirt all this time? Anyway, it would be much easier to find his way out of here with a little light. His finger was just about to flip it on when,

"jobe…"

_'What was that?' _ His hand dropped away from the torch and he looked cautiously over his shoulder. Of course, Jobe saw nothing.

"Is there someone back there?" His only answer was the sound of dripping water. Scowling, his finger reached for the flashlight again.

"don't do it, jobe" Jobe took a step back as the voice hissed again, almost pleading with him.

"Why not?" His eyes scanned over the darkness, trying to make out whoever it was who could see him.

"because then the blind will see, you're so much safer in the dark." It replied with a strangulated rasp. Jobe swallowed what felt like a lead ball forming in his throat; this voice of warning was far from comforting. 

"If I'm in danger, then how do I get out of here?" Jobe really hoped whoever it was couldn't hear the naked fear in his voice.

"why would you want to leave us, jobe? you belong down here with _us_, jobe, everything's _so_ simpler floating here in the dark. come jobe, come" There was a pause and in it, Jobe felt his blood run cold. "_float _with ussss…" The voice lost all its softness, grating in Jobe's ear as the sentence came to an end. Waves of nausea swept over him as he madly grabbed at the flash light but something in the water stroked against his legs. Jobe screamed and tried to get away from whatever was lurking in the water with him but he only succeeded in losing his footing. As he fell backwards, Jobe felt it wrap itself around his body with horrific speed. Whatever was binding him felt like a thick line of rubbery rope but through his thin shirt, Jobe could feel it squirming against his skin as it drew round him in an ever-tightening grip. The living rope had encased him up to his shoulders and was now crushing him between its countless rolls of skin. Jobe let out a gasp as it constricted even tighter.

"don't fight us jobe, everything's so much easier when you _float_." He could feel the warm sticky breath on his cheek as the unseen monster whispered in his ear. Jobe could feel it grinning as it squeezed just that little bit tighter every time Jobe breathed out. He could barely draw a breath now and it felt as though his head was going to pop like a champagne cork as it thudded with the force of a base drum. Jobe's arm was beginning to be imprinted into his chest but he could feel the hard shape of the flashlight against it. If only he could…

His captor must have know what Jobe was planning for it's cruel voice began to chat again.

"we told you you'd be safer in the dark. we shall have to blind you are selves if you aren't going to listen to us…"

Two clammy hands clamped themselves onto Jobe's face, probing his features with long brittle fingers. The smell of rot and rancid meat was almost too much for Jobe sending his gut into a vicious spasm as the sharp fingers ran over his nose. Finally, they found what they were searching for and came to a rest over his eye and held his lids shut. Almost lovingly, it pressed its thumbs into the sockets of Jobe's eyes; causing him to use what little breath he had left to scream. For a fleeting moment, images of his two eyes exploding in a shower of white liquid and tissue filled Jobe's head and he did the only thing he could.

He bit down as hard as he could on anything he could get his teeth on. A shrill hiss sliced through the air as Jobe's teeth clamped down on its thin wrist and viciously tore at the damp skin. He felt it rupture as a cold liquid (that tasted what Jobe imagined bleach would taste like) filled his mouth.

Instantly, the creature withdrew and the binding rolls fell away from Jobe's body. He spat out the rank mouthful and hastily tried to refill his crushed lungs. The sound of the creature spitting in rage echoed around the room as Jobe reached for the flashlight. He was going to turn the damn thing on if it was the last thing he did. There was a click and blinding light flooded the room, so bright to Jobe's unjust eyes that he had to squint. The water that sloshed against his legs was so dark that it actually seemed to absorb all the light from the tiny bulb, whilst the walls seemed caked in thick layers of brown grim, so deep that the numerous pipes that ran along it looked more like veins. They also ran along the ceiling in a crazy network that made no sense but Jobe wasn't worried about that, he was more taken aback by the thing that hung from the pipes, glaring at Jobe with wide, bloodshot eyes, void of pupils. At first, Jobe thought it was some kind of snake, but snakes had scales. This thing looked like someone had wrapped it up in decaying, white flesh. It's length was impossible to judge as it's spiny tail lay coiled around the pipe it hung down from but for a second, Jobe swore he saw what looked like partially formed legs beneath it's skin. The snake's tail ended in a frail human torso. The serpent's bones could clearly be seen poking up from it's stretched flesh that was so taught, they threatened to burst through. It looked as though it was nothing more than a skeleton, with its two stick-like arms shielding it's face from the torch's light. Slowly they lowered and Jobe got to see the snake's hideous visage. A small ridge of bone lined the top of its melon-shaped skull, tracing down to join it's protruding spine. It had two reptilian slits for nostrils that slowly flapped as the snake breathed in and out and a pair of long, slender white fangs slipped over its tight lips.

By some miracle of god's work, Jobe had managed to keep a hold of the metal pole during the snake's lethal embrace. Holding it in front of him, Jobe never took his eyes off the leering face.

"Wh.. What the hell are you?" Jobe took a step back, trying to put as much distance between him and the snake. It pulled its lips back in a mocking grin, reviling even more needle thin teeth, obviously reveling in its victim's sheer terror. 

"what am I? we are greed, jobe and you can't escape from us for we live in the heart of every man!"

Greed's lips had risen so far that its discolored gums were exposed to the air. The smile made Jobe feel ill, it was so malicious that he feared for his sanity if he looked at it any longer. He quickly jabbed the pole at the snake's head but it easily swayed around it and one of its bony hands shot out with frightening agility. Greed's fingers locked around the pole and yanked it back, pulling Jobe in. He was so close that the snake's flat nose hovered just inches from his own and he could feel the air rush in and out from the two tiny slits. A thin, forked tongue darted between its teeth and it tutted.

"why do you resist? everything will be so much easier, here in the dark." With a crack, its face exploded open, splitting vertically down the middle. Spittle flew from yawning maw as teeth slid from its gums that lined every edge of the mouth. Jobe just froze, transfixed by the dark hole right at its center that seemed to draw him in. He could do nothing as the mouth locked around his shoulder but watch in dumb horror. It was only when he felt the rows of fangs penetrate his skin like white-hot daggers when he screamed. Jobe could fell Greed's foul venom pump into him and run under his skin like boiling water. Finally, the mouth detached itself from his shoulder and the head reformed, still grinning at Jobe with bloodstained teeth. The strength seemed to be instantly drained from his legs and he fell to his knees. He could no longer sense the water around him as slowly his body became numb. Jobe's head seemed to gain a hundred pounds in the space of five seconds and it slumped down onto his chest. Greed slipped its slender hand under his lolling chin and gently lifted Jobe's head up so it could stare right into his heavy lidded eyes. 

"it won't be long now, soon you can _float_ with us." It crooned softly. Jobe could barely make out Greed's words as it felt as though his head had been wrapped in cotton wool. Even the face in front of him was beginning to fade, blurring into its dark background as the lines that held it together melted away.

Jobe was aware that there was a sudden bang followed by the darkness lifting ever so slightly. Greed's hand fell away from his chin and Jobe's head slumped forward again. Something else had caught Greed's attention and Jobe tried to turn his head towards the new light source to see what it was but it didn't even feel like his head was attached to his body anymore. It was as if the poison was slowly blotting out every thing around him, trying to smother him in a new type of darkness that he could never escape from.

With a straining amount of effort, Jobe managed to focus his eyes for a moment and joined Greed in staring at an open door he'd never noticed before. In it stood a figure but the dim light that shone from behind it made it nigh on impossible to make out. There was something long that extended from one of the arms that hung limply by the figurer's side. Occasionally, it would glint in the pale light as the newcomer's body heaved with heavy breaths. If Jobe's brain had been working anywhere near it's normal brain he could have guessed they'd come a running, possibly after hearing him scream like a girl.

Greed shouted at the figure, spitting angrily as it spoke. It merely raised the long metal weapon it held in response, spreading its feet out in preparation of the snake's attack. 

Jobe didn't make out the words the figure muttered but Greed sure did for it let out a screeching roar and threw itself suiciadally towards the pointed weapon. The newcomer nimbly sidestepped out of the way as the over-sized snake flew pastas its fangs snapped at empty air. Jobe could barely make out the figure bringing their weapon down on Greed's back, catching it mid-lunge. The snake was brought prematurely to the ground in a spray of water. The weapon came down again and again as the figure stood silhouetted in the doorway, grunts of frustration passed through its lips as it frantically attacked the snake. The sound of splashing water came to an end as the figure stood upright, triumphantly staring down at the spot where a bloodied Greed lay. Silence washed over the room and the figure looked at Jobe for the first time. Jobe only managed to make a feeble whimper before the last of his strength ebbed away and he sub came to the darkness.

*    *    *

For a moment, She could only stare at the dark water beneath her feet, waiting for the serpent to rise up an attack her when she wasn't looking. She'd dealt with Greed enough times to know how his sick mind worked and had enough sense to know it would be a bad idea to be here when he woke up. She looked at the blood stained kantana she gripped tightly and wondered if he would wake up this time. She gave herself a mental slap for being so naive.

_'He always wakes up. They never can truly die, the lot of them…'_

She looked up, scanning the darkness looking for Greed's latest victim and sure enough, there they were. The man was kneeling in the water, trembling violently. A small whimper escaped his throat before he started to slump towards the water. With a sudden burst of speed, she was next to him and managed to catch him by the scruff of his neck before he fell face first into the water. The skin beneath his hand was slick with sweat and felt as though molten lead was running underneath it.

"No!" She was probably too late but she could still try to save him. With a grunt, she slung him over her shoulders as if he was a stack of potatoes. Trying to ignore the fact that he seemed to weigh more than twenty sacks of potatoes, she staggered out of the room and tried to ignore the fact that Greed's body was not where she'd left it.

I must apologies for the 'IT' references but it's been responsible for many sleepless nights and I just couldn't help myself.


	9. Resident

Remember those exams I was talking about? Well, they're just around the corner so this may be the last chapter for a while. But never fear, I intend to finish this story as it's been floating around inside my head for moths and I fear for my sanity if I don't. Now, lets meet the newest edition to the cast.

Chapter 8: Resident 

Jobe had been awake for a while but he still refused to open his eyes. Firstly, he felt as though he'd been run over by a steam roller and every muscle ached at just the thought of moving but that was only part of the reason Jobe hadn't rose. Every second he held his lids tightly shut was one less second he had to spend in this living nightmare.

At least he wasn't still in that room with Mr. Personality of the Year. His ribs still felt as though there were bands of iron wrapped around them, causing him to inhale with ragged breaths. Even with his eyes tightly clamped shut, he could tell he was no longer in that god-forsaken room. The sound of groaning pipes (that reminded him of the temperamental radiator that barely made his apartment habital) had replaced the sound of churning water. It was a comforting thought and Jobe smiled for a moment as he entertained the idea, but the hard, jagged springs that dug into his back from the thin mattress he lay on continuously chased the dream away. With a groan, he rolled on to his side as one dug just that little bit deeper into his flesh but despite that, this was the comfiest place he'd been during his entire trip through Silent Hill.

It was a laborious cry of protest from the pipe system, sounding more like a baying wounded animal that finally forced Jobe to open his eyes. He was, as he suspected, lying on a wafer thin mattress but he tore his head away from it as soon as his eyes registered its state. It was stained every color of a twisted rainbow, ranging from rancid browns to musty grays. God knows what had been spilled on it and occasionally, stuffing puffed out in little sodden clouds from a whole assort ion of holes. It reminded Jobe more of innards spilling from gapping wounds, leading Jobe to ponder if this place really was beginning to get to him. 

Jobe through off the rag that had been posing as a blanket. It was probably home to god knows how many millions of nits and parasites, and just looking at it was enough to make his skin crawl. Jobe gratefully dragged his eyes away from the 'blanket' and sat up on the make shift bed. He held his head in his hands and tried to ignore the fact he felt although he'd come down with the mother of all flue viruses. Jobe's wondering eyes came to rest on the small and rather battered bedside table. A lamp, minus the shade shone with a dim light as it illuminated the small bottles and plastic containers that littered the table. Cautiously, Jobe picked up the closest packet, held it up the bulb and squinted as he tried to read the tiny print.

'Pain killers'

On a second look, it was clear that all the plastic containers held various types of medicine, most had 'prescription only' typed across them in large, unmistakable writing. There was every thing, ranging from anti-biotic to tranquilizers. It was a pill popper's wet dream.

Jobe place the packet back down on the table and slowly rose from the creaky bed, not a hundred percent sure he wanted to meet his savior. He began to walk to the door of the small, dingy room but halted when he heard the unmistakable sound of someone clearing their throat. Jobe staled and silently weighed up his options but decided against running from the room. After all, his trusty pole and handgun seemed to be missing, along with that damn mobile phone. At a painfully slow speed, he turned to face whoever owned this charming little ghetto.

At first, Jobe thought the room was empty, save for a pile of dirty rags strewn across a worn armchair. It was only when they stood up, he relised there was someone sitting there. 

The girl's shabby attire seemed to let her blend into background like some human chameleon. The faded, baggy and possibly once green hooded jumper hung loosely from her body, while her hands were thrust firmly into its front pocket. Her black trousers were also way too large for her slender frame and they ended in tatters, crusty with untold layers of muck and grime. The hood was pulled firmly down over her head, so most of it was counseled in a dark shadow. Even so, Jobe could feel the girl's eyes on him, examining him from head to toe.

For a moment, they just stood there in silence that grew more unbearable with every passing second.

"You're the one who saved me, right?" She nodded slowly but didn't say anything, letting that empty silence creep up on them again. "Thank you."

Again, she made no response but stared at Jobe like some beast trying to enforce their authority.

'This is like talking to a brick wall…and there is the possibility that all these pills have reduced her brain to mush, if they're hers.' 

He took a step towards her but she flinched and scuffled backwards. The air of dominance seemed to have left her in the blink of an eye as her body turned in upon itself, her head sunk down between her rounded shoulders.

"Why are you here?" Her voice came out no louder than a whisper but even so, Jobe could hear its horse tone, as though she suffered from laryngitis or some other hideous throat desies.

"I'm looking for a friend of mine, we were separated after we crashed not to far from this town. I figured he'd be here but_"

One of the girl's hands flew from the pocket and slammed down on the back of the armchair, causing a cloud of dust to rise up into the air.

"Forget about him, he's probably already dead. People don't tend to survive for very long here."

Her harsh gravely voice hit Jobe and let doubt surface to the top of his mind. He hadn't considered the fact that Phil could be dead.

'Time to take your head out of the clouds' How could a man who, as far as Jobe could tell, had been seriously injured last two minuets in this hell on earth. Jobe had left the car wreck unscathed and he was having enough trouble as it was. 

Obviously, his feelings had been as easy to read as an open book for the girl seemed to shrink back down again.

"I-I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that. It's just that…" She trailed off with a sigh, beating the base of her palm against her forehead softly as she searched for words. "This town, it draws people here and it won't let them go until it's through with them. You must leave." Jobe couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.

"So what are you saying, Silent Hill's alive?" This was starting to get too much. Jobe was beginning to feel as though he was in a bad horror novel.

The girl bit down on her lower lip.

"In a way, I guess it is." Normally, Jobe would have laughed, but the last few hours had been far from normal. Also, even if this girl did flip from aggressive to passive in 0.2 seconds, there was something in her voice that struck a chord with Jobe.

"If you'd let me," her hand dove back into the pocket and she took a step towards Jobe, "I could get you out of here right now." It seemed to be more of a plea than a request but it was his turn to take a step back.

"I how do I know I can trust you, huh? You could be just as insane as that other woman." That memory of that encounter was just a little too fresh on his mind. The girl's body seemed to stiffen, like a dog that had caught a sent.

"What woman?" Her voice had lost the little warmth it had.

"I didn't catch her name, but she was real pasty and had hair that was almost…white_"

"You stay the hell away from Claudia!" The girl exploded with a roar, causing her voice to almost break up as she thrust her hidden face into Jobe's.

"Claudia?" He was so taken a back that he could merely repeat the name stupidly. The girl with drew her head and began pacing about the room angrily, spitting words like they were foul venom.

"That woman's bad news, we have to get you out of here before_"

"Whoa!" Jobe stuck his arm out, halting her as she went to make another pass. From the way her head snapped up, it suddenly didn't seem like such a good idea and for a moment, he truly believed she might rip his arm from its socket. Fortunately, she seemed ready to listen to him.

"I am not forsaking my friend in this hell hole." She opened her mouth to protest but Jobe cut her off. "Even if you drag me out of this town, I'd come back so don't try to stop me."

The girl remained silent and Jobe could feel her eye's studying him from behind the hood.

"But_"

"No." Jobe shook his head firmly. "I'm not leaving without Phil."  
Defeated, the girl let her head droop.

"If that's the case, then I guess I should help you find him if your going too damn stubborn to do what's right." She scuttled past him to the door that Jobe had considered escaping out of only moments before. She stopped and looked over her shoulder as her hand brushed the door handle.

"You coming?"

  


	10. A rather warped existance

I still have exams on so I probably should have stopped writing…. nah.

Anyway, Shakahanna I totally agree with you that I SUCK at dialogue and Jobe's character is so flat that when he turns side-on, he disappears. But if it was so painful to read then why didn't you stop. Duh. And what else are you meant to say if a big chunk of road disappears into nowhere? I will try to improve on these aspects of my story and the formatting towards the end of the chapter went a little odd, so watch out.

Well, lets see what our protagonist and deuteragonist are up too…(It's amazing what you learn in Classics)

Chapter 9: A rather warped existence

The girl shot through the door, leaving Jobe to scratch his head, trying to come to a sensible conclusion about his new found ally. The only one that seemed convincing was that she was completely insane. Overhead, one of the pipes let out a monstrous groan, reminding Jobe that the last thing he wanted to be was on his own, even if his new found company was a little eccentric. He caught the heavy door, as it swung closed and stepped through to the unknown.

He found himself in a long, dark corridor that looked like it the oval passages in the claustrophobic London Underground. Thin overhead lights flickered, casting a spectral light over the tiled floor. Just up ahead of him, he could make out the form of the girl, already fiddling with the lock on another door. The click of it opening echoed up the small tunnel and the noise sounded more like someone popping a knuckle, causing Jobe to shudder. Maybe this place was alive after all.

_'Don't be stupid' _He scolded himself as walked briskly to join the girl, his feet squeaking against the wet and sodden tiles as his trainers scuffed against them. 

She was already holding the door open for Jobe, waiting patiently for him to catch up. As he went to pass through the door's threshold, he caught a glimpse of its metal surface and stopped. There were tiny little gashes engraved into its surface, all tallied up.

"What are these?" There were at least five hundred of small scratches. Jobe turned to the girl but her head drooped as she tried to avoid his questioning eye. For a moment, she treaded water as she debated whether or not to answer.

"There's a scratch for every day I've been here. I lost count after a year…" She trailed off, like a child confessing a guilty secret. Jobe just stared in disbelief and said the only thing he could.

"Shit" He muttered softly_,' no wonder this girl was so screwed up.' _ She appeared to be no older than seventeen, possibly eighteen and had spent what looked like two years here.

"So why don't you just leave?" The moment the words left his mouth, Jobe knew he was walking on eggshells. Even in the poor light, he could see her grip on the door tightening as if the fingers were trying to gouge a series of furious holes into it.

"Don't you think I've tried to get away?" Her voice scratched angrily at the inside of Jobe's skull, causing him to wince. "No matter where I go, I still end up back here. It's as if every road I take leads right back to this town." She exhaled heavily, trying to contain her self but the accusing, almost unbelieving look this man was giving her was almost too much.

'Have to calm down…' She rubbed the bridge of her nose in an attempt to chase away the anger that boiled inside her. "Please, just go inside." Jobe didn't dare to not comply with her request. 

This room was practically identical to the one he'd woken up in, although the furnishing was somewhat different. It looked more like a kitchen the night after furious house party gone wrong. Rusting cupboards lined one wall, most had lost their doors or (what looked like) wood had warped so badly that they were impossible to open. Dusty cans and bottles rested on collapsing shelves that looked as though they'd been put up by someone trying to read a Japanese D.I.Y manual. A lonely chair that threatened to collapse at the thought of being sat upon sat dejectedly the centre of the room.

"What is this place?" Jobe wondered aloud as he goggled at the make shift room, not noticing as the girl ambled past him. Her head twitched nervously at the sound of his voice as if she expected Jobe to beat her if she didn't answer the question immediately. She reached up to one of the shelves and pulled down a solitary can. 

"At the moment, we're underneath Silent Hill. This is one of the water works stations, I-I think. " The words came out in a babbling torrent, so fast Jobe struggled to make most of them out. "But none of this stuff was here when I f-found it." With a nod of her head, she motioned to the furniture whilst carefully examining the ingredients of the can. Every now and then, her eyes would dart to Jobe as if he was some kind of predator, waiting for her to look away just long enough for him to creep up on her. Jobe tentivly sat on the decomposing chair and was almost disappointed that it didn't fall apart.

"So where'd you get all this stuff, it's not like you could hall it out of the sewers." He let out a nervous laugh, not entirely convinced that she couldn't but then armchairs and countless medical supplies sure as hell didn't belong in a water station. No longer seeing Jobe as a threat, the girl answered in a far away tone, seeming totally entranced by the can of soup she held.

"I don't know, most of it just turns up, but I found some of it in the houses and apartments." Without warning, she produced a knife from nowhere and savagely impaled the soup can, causing some of its contence to spurt out like blood. Jobe almost felt sorry for it.

"The medicine and stuff I got from the hospital but I really wouldn't go there if I was you." Completely unfazed by the violent massacre of the soup can, she began to drain its sorry contence. Jobe just watched her in disbelief. It was if she was a hundred different people rolled into one. Saying he was scared of her was a serious understatement.  

She put the can down and turned to Jobe.

"If you want anything just help yourself, I was going to get some stuff ready." And with that, she left through yet another door, abandoning Jobe to his own devises.

He looked to the ceiling, stained with damp and sighed. Life would be too easy if he'd bumped into someone sane.

However, he was thankful that she'd saved him from becoming Greed's latest victim, and if she'd been able to keep herself alive for two years Jobe wasn't about to turn down her help. As long as she didn't start ranting about god, she was his new best fiend as far as Jobe was concerned.

 Slowly, he slid off the chair and began to prowl threw the sorry kitchen. His eyes came to rest on a remarkably clean fridge, it's pristine white surface stuck out like a sore thumb in this world of rot and stain. Coming to think of it, he was damn hungry. He hadn't eaten for almost a day by now. His stomach mewed in anticipation as he crouched down and went to open it. A soft, welcoming light fell across his face as he opened the door and rummaged thought the heard of plastic bags that crowded on the shelves. Jobe pulled one out, letting the bag unfurl as he examined the contence. What looked like a very bland mixture of Spam and corn-beef stared back at Jobe. Shrugging, he opened the bag and carefully tore off some of the meat before tentively popping it into his mouth. It wasn't that bad but he might as well see what else there was.

Jobe caught sight of a much darker package hidden away at the back of the fridge that looked far more appetizing Spam/beef hybrid. Whatever it was, it weighed a tonne. Jobe groaned as he pulled it from the fridge. Resting it on his lap, Jobe pulled back the cling-film to get a better look at his prize but it took his brain a few seconds to work out what he was looking at.

When it did, he screamed.

Jobe leapt up from the floor, sending the hunk of met flying from his lap. It landed on the floor with a wet slap and lay there harmlessly as Jobe tried to put as much distance possible between it and him. A pair of lifeless black eyes watched Jobe as he tried to convince himself that he was only seeing things but no matter how many times he blinked, the severed dog head was still lying there. Actually, it wouldn't have been so bad if it was a normal dog's head but this thing was warped in every way imaginable. It's naked moisten flesh twinkled in the harsh light that poured from the refrigerator, making it look almost alive while it's twisted snout was pulled back, revealing razor sharp fangs. The point where the head had been crudely severed from its body ended in thin slivers of its rancid flesh.

"Oh dear god…"

Jobe clamped a hand over his mouth and willed him self-not to be sick.

'What the FUCK is one of those things doing in her fridge?' 

This of course raised the question of what that meat was he'd just eaten. A dry, deep retch escaped Jobe's throat as he ran to the rusting sink and empted the contense of his stomach into it.

Trembling, Jobe finally managed to find the nerve to face the world again. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he rose up from the sink and glanced at the head. Its lips were pulled back into an insane, hideous grin that mocked Jobe as its ragged tough poked through its irregular, oversized teeth. With a kick, Jobe booted it back into to the fridge and slammed the door. Yet again, the thought of running from this place screaming flashed into his mind, more tempting than ever. What if he was the next thing to end up in the girl's fridge, wrapped up in cellophane? But then why would she bother to save him? Maybe this dog was the only thing to eat, it wasn't like there was a local seven eleven down the road.  

If he ever escaped from Silent Hill, Jobe swore he'd becoming a vegetarian. 

*     *     *

"Did you get anything to eat?" The question was asked so innocently that Jobe didn't have the heart to ask her why there was a decapitated dog in her fridge.

"No, I…lost my appetite."

"Oh, sorry." 

Jobe had found her in yet another psychotically decorated room that did nothing to convince him that she was a normal, sane human being. 

It was as if Jobe had walked into some warped museum. The far end of the room was decorated by every kind of weapon imaginable, ranging from a huge range of firearms (including roughly ten hand guns, a vicious looking shot gun and what appeared to be a hunting rifle) to hand-held weapons, some of which were just painful to look at. Most of them hung suspended by nails while others were trussed up like turkeys. Overshadowing all of them was the infamous kantana Jobe recognized from earlier, glinting wickedly from where it rested on a crudely set up stand. A heavy bookshelf ran across the other wall. Bizarre trinkets littered its shelves along with dog-eared books and stained letters, tattooed with arcane symbols. One shelf was exclusively taken up by an unfathomable number of ammunition boxes, piled on top of each other in a hurdy-gurdy catalogue

"What do you do when your not funding revolutions?"

The girl looked up from Jobe's handgun that she'd been trying to unclog and turned to him.

 "I guess I spend my spare time trying to stay alive." She answered cynically before swivelling back round to the table on the randomly place office chair. As she huddled back over the gun, a short bray of what could have been laughter shook her frame.

'At least she has a sense of humour…of sorts' 

Stuffed away in the corner was the strangest thing of all. From where it sat on the ground, the sharp pyramid came up to Jobe's waste, ending in a fine point. Its edges were razor sharp and the whole thing looked as though it had been painted with a mixture of gore and dried blood. Jobe gave it a short tap with his foot, causing the pyramid to peel like a bell but the sound was so deep and metallic it caused a shiver to run up his spine. It sounded more like a roaring bear than anything forged by man.

"You have the weirdest things down here, I mean what the hell is up with this bell?" Jobe asked, keeping his eyes firmly on the crimson structure, not sure if he trusted it enough to let it out of his sight. Just looking at it filled him with a deep sense of dread that seemed to eat him up from the inside like an insane cancer.

"That? I found it under the hotel, and it's some kind of helmet."

"What would wear a thing like this? It's must weigh a tonne!" He kicked it again as if to get his point across. It seemed to be made from some kind of indistinguishable metal that flaked with rust.

"You really don't want to know." The rasp of an answer was far from comforting. 

Giving the mystery object one last glance, Jobe made his way over to the workbench the girl was sat at, totally absorbed with fixing the gun. For a while, only the whine of the file filled the room as she pushed it up the barrel of the gun as she tried to get whatever was jamming it out.

"Your name's Jobe, isn't it?"

Jobe was so taken aback by the fact that the girl had started a conversation that it took a moment for him to realise she knew his name without asking.

"Yes, but… Wait, how did you know?"

Instantly, the slightly sociable girl disappeared, replaced by that submissive creature that retreated away from him into her chair.

"I-I-I'm sorry, I just overheard you talking about it when I carried you here. You were mumbling stuff and_"

"Slow down" Jobe raised his hands to signal for her to stop, partly because he was worried she could carry on like that until she collapsed from lack of oxygen. "I'm not mad at you or anything, I just wanted to know where you heard it, okay?"

The girl nodded sharply and seemed to relax somewhat, moving back into the chair, no longer perched on its edge.  Jobe was more concerned with whatever he could have let slip while high on Greed's venom. He wasn't exactly comfortable that she could be in possession of every detail of his less than glorious life.

"What's your name then? I mean all I know about you is that you've got some really odd hobbies."

Jobe jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the display case as he spoke.

(And a seriously screwed up taste in food) Fortunately, he decided to not include this in his pathetic attempt to lighten up the mood. For a moment, her partially visible mouth formed an amused grin before the girl opened it to reply, and in that instant, the humour seemed to be drained from her. The lips moved but no sound came out as they tried to say some unpronounceable syllable.

"I can't remember…it's not that important anyway." The second part of her answer came out in a hurry as she kept her eyes fixed on the file as it forced its way in and out of the gun's barrel. From the tone of her voice, it was clear she didn't want any follow up questions and Jobe could tell she wasn't about to let him indulge in the details of her life.

"So what am I meant to call you then?"

She let out a frustrated sigh and silently contemplated on ramming the file through his face, but then he might run off, unable to understand she just wanted him to SHUT UP while she was working. Anyway, 'normal' people didn't act like that.

"You can call me ZaZa Gabourgh if it makes you happy."

The room fell silent except for the grating gnaw of the file. What should he call his guide through this hell he'd got himself in? The answer came so quickly that he almost laughed out loud just at the though of how well it fitted the situation.

"How about Virgil?"


	11. Dante & Virgil

I have FINALLY finished those exams (hallelujah!) and I would have put this up sooner but I've been away. But enough about me, on with the show!

Chapter 10: Dante & Virgil

The recently renamed Virgil pivoted the chair to face Jobe, holding out his gun. In the other was the file, coated in some sticky tar-like gunk that trickled slowly over the metal.

At first, Jobe had thought she would turn down the name as she stared coolly at him

_"And I though you were going to name me after you dog" _She'd snorted in response before continuing to try and restore the gun to its former glory. And so an almost silent agreement was reached between the two, at least Jobe took her grunt as a positive response.

"I fixed it as best as I could but it was pretty banged up…" Jobe hardly what she said as he looked down at the gun, or rather the hand that held it. He'd never noticed them before, probably due to the dim light supplied by the dingy light bulbs that tried in vain to illuminate the room, but he couldn't fail to overlook them now.

Gauze was wrapped tightly over her skin, covering everything from her wrist to her fingers in tight, constricting bands. It was clear that the material had lost its pristine, white tone long ago. It, like everything that had spent too much time in Silent Hill, looked as though it was decaying, rotting away. Rusty, brown stains seeped through the Band-Aids as if they had once concealed open wounds but nobody had been bothered to change the dressing, even after they'd closed.

"Your hands, what_"

A look of confusion crossed Virgil's face but it was chased away as soon as she looked down to see what had entranced Jobe. Instantly her hands recoiled, letting the gun fall softly onto Jobe's lap as they recoiled into the sanctuary of the ragged sweatshirt.

He could vaguely make out a hurried "I'm sorry" as the girl hastily rose from the chair and shuffled over to the worm-eaten bookcase. He watched her with concern but realised that this was going to be another one of 'those topics' that was not going to be discussed, much like trying to start a conversation about sex with one's parents. Jobe picked up the gun, along with the cell phone, stuffing the firearm into his belt so it could make friends with the lead pole. He clipped the torch back onto the front of his shirt while keeping an eye on the girl. Obviously, there was a lot more to Virgil than what met the eye but Jobe wasn't sure he really wanted to know what lay concealed beneath her protective outer layer.

"Anyway, it doesn't matter," She continued, pulling what looked like a map from underneath a heavy book.  "We've wasted enough time already, we need to get going." The bandaged fingers began to feverishly fold the map until it was an impossibly small square before it disappeared into a pocket. She rummaged the shelf before letting out a warning "catch" and casually tossing one of the ammo boxes at Jobe, who mealy looked questionably at it. This was probably the closet he'd ever come to holding a loaded gun. He fumbled with the small firearm, nearly spilling all the bullets on the floor while attempting to load it. After numerous curses, he finally managed to slot the last bullet into the chamber.

"God help me if this gun runs out of ammo while some thing is trying to rip me apart." He looked up, only to find the two black barrels of the shotgun hovering inches away from his face. It was a far from comforting sight and that must have been clear from the look on his face.

"Don't worry, I'm not about to re-paint the walls with the remains of your head." Jobe let out a painfully force laugh and side-stepped out of the guns line of fire, just in case the girl got a little trigger-happy.

Placing the now almost empty box of ammo away, he straightened up and stretched.

_'Do I really want to go back out there?'_  Jobe chased the thought out of his head. No matter how much he didn't want to go back out there, he knew he had to. His friend was still out there and if he turned his back on Phil, he was no better than the things that roamed this town's streets.

 "So how do we get out of here?"

Virgil's face twisted into a mysterious grin as she inserted the kantana into a make shift sheath.

"You'll see, just you wait."

Jobe silently wondered how anyone could get exited about trekking through a sewer. But then again, this was Virgil he was talking about.

*   *   *

Shit. Pure shit.

Those were the first words that entered Jobe's mind as he inhaled the damp air about him. The waste of people swirled about his feet in little congealed puddles as he walked. The only way Jobe could describe the smell was grey, like things had been left to age down here for to long and had finally rotted from the oppressive damp and darkness.

_'Things like Virgil...'_

The harsh, rotting and horribly sweet odder seemed to be uncensored as it rose up from the tiles that coated the circular tunnel. Water dripped from the ceiling, hanging there and growing fat before falling to earth with an echoing 'plip' as it joined the many puddles on the floor. Jobe's back was soaked through from the artificial rainfall and every now and then, an unsettlingly warm droplet of water would fall on his neck and trace his vertebrate down the back of his shirt. This never failed to send a little shiver up his spine. It felt as if he was trying to clamber out of the gut of some unfathomably colossal creature that had swallowed him whole.

"Oh man" Jobe cursed under his breath as he jumped down from the platform. Within seconds of hitting the ground, he'd felt the cool rancid water seep into his shoes. Casting the beam of light that emitted from the torch down, Jobe watched in disgust at the point where his ankles disappeared into the black water, making it look as though he was wading through mud. They'd only been going for what could barely have been five minuets and already he had no idea where he was going. Virgil on the other hand seemed to know this place like the back of her hand, never pausing as she led him down yet another identical passage way. If it wasn't for the feeble beam of light supplied from the torch, Jobe doubted that he'd be able to see his hand, even if he waved it right in front of his face.

Just before him, He could just about make out Virgil staring back at him, crouching slightly so her head didn't scrap against the low ceiling.

"Guess I picked a bad day to wear my new shoes, huh?" The girl merely made one of her indistinguishable grunting noises before turning tail and began loping down the tunnel like some overgrown shaggy wolf.

To quickly it seemed that Virgil disappear from sight, swallowed up by the claustrophobic darkness and already, the sound of her footfall was beginning to melt in to the chorus of whining pipes and dripping water. It was almost as though the town wanted him to lose her, for him to get lost in this incomprehensible labyrinth of drains and tunnels. Jobe's flesh began to tingle as he mulled the thought over and quickly scurried after her. He really didn't fancy the idea of wondering around this place on his own, who knew what was down here with them in the dark.

*   *   *

God only knew how long they'd spent meandering through the underground complex. Time seemed to have grinded to a halt, letting the minuets play on for hours and Jobe was finding that his companion hadn't done anything to make the journey any more bearable. If anything, she seemed oblivious of Jobe's existence. But then, there were some upsides. The tunnel they were in had widened out in all directions allowing the pair to walk side by side and neither of them had to crouch low anymore to avoid grazing their heads against the rotting curve of the roof. Jobe's feared that if he had to walk bent low for any longer, he might not be able to stand up straight ever again. Even now, his back still twanged with cramp.

Light seemed to be filtering in from somewhere as well. It wasn't much but at least Jobe could now barley make out his surroundings.

"Do the words 'greed' and 'wrath' mean anything to you?" Jobe just couldn't help popping the question; it had been gnawing away at the inside of his head for most of the journey, growing steadily from an irritating niggel to full-blown ravenous curiosity.

"They're two of seven sins that pave the way to hell." Virgil's voice kept that same monotonous tone that echoed dryly of the sodden walls and for a brief moment, Jobe whished she wouldn't be so melodramatic and revert back to being over-apologetic or just plain irritable. At lest then she had some character.

"But they're just words, that's all."

As the words left Jobe's mouth, she seemed to slow but just for a second and in that brief space of time, he could see apprehension. Or maybe it was pity.

"Sometimes, words and feelings can be a lot more than emotions or a group of letters. Especially here."

"So what, that snake back there was some kind of manifestation?" Jobe jabbed his finger back over his shoulder in the direction he guessed they'd come from, a look of confusion began to cloud his face. Virgil cocked her head to one side, as she tried to find the words to describe what was so clear in her head.

"Think of it more as an embodiment."

"Let me guess, there's _just _somethin_g_ about this town that brings this kind of stuff to life."  

One of the girl's fingers snapped up in front of Jobe's face, bringing his sentence to an abrupt close. Virgil stood completely still, not even breathing as se tried to latch onto whatever sound had caught her attention. All Jobe could hear was the sound of dripping water and the irregular rusty groan of the pipes.

"What is_"

"Shh!" She hushed him angrily through dried lips and as her warning died away, Jobe heard the low moan. It sounded like a piece of dying machinery on its last legs. The noise made his brain tingle, as if someone had pulled a nil down a chalkboard. The pair of them seemed to have become instantly frozen to the spot, waiting for the sound to come again and confirm itself. They only had to wait about ten seconds for the echoing growl and when it reached their ears, it sounded uncomfortably nearer.

Virgil's finger, which had been hovering in front of hr lip all this time, fell away to her side.

"Stay here." She began to walk away and to Jobe's horror, towards the direction the moaning was coming from. 

"Are you completely insane!" He hissed angrily though clenched teeth. The last thing he wanted was for Virgil to go and get her self killed.

A "Maybe…" came floating back up the tunnel.

 Right now, she was acting like one of those people in a horror film who the audience hate. The kind of person who dose something really stupid, resulting in them getting butchered like a pig while the audience scream out warnings and throw popcorn at the screen. Right now, Virgil was playing that part quite nicely. 

Jobe glared at her in frustration as she lent around the last corner they'd taken, whishing she'd come back.

In the dim, almost nonexistent light, Virgil could barely see anything as she peered up the tunnel but…

_'What?'_

She squinted her eyes as she tried to force them to adjust to the dark. There was something down there, she could just about make out its form, framed in the light but whatever it was so still that it melted into the darkness surrounding it, making its size impossible to judge. Subconsciously, she felt one of her hands fall onto the hilt of the kantana. Maybe going back to Jobe wasn't such a bad idea… 

"Virgil!"

The agitated call came again and the thing in the dark jerked as if it had been waiting for Jobe to say something, to give away their position.

_'Because this thing's been hunting us ever since we came down here.'_

In the silence, she could hear a soft splash as one of its feet came down, closing the distance between them. As if she and the thing in the dark were in some terrible waltz, Virgil took a step back and with horrifying clarity, she knew what it was before them and that they would be severely fucked if she and Jobe didn't run like hell. Now.

She span around and shot back down the tunnel as the darkness came crashing after her. 

 


	12. Behind the Veil

Ok, this did take me a while but it is five pages worth of writing so I hope that makes up for it. Also, I split it up into two bits as this is twice as long as most of my chapters.

I have read the Divine Comedy and I thought it was a wonderful piece of literature and yes; there are one or two references to it in here.

Now if you can excuse me, I think I'm going to lie down for a while…*collapses over key board*                                      

Chapter 11: Behind the veil

Part 1:confruntation 

"Virgil!" Jobe squinted his eyes in a desperate attempt to make out the shape of his slightly eccentric companion. Why was she just standing there? It was like whatching a deer caught in the headlights, transfixed by its oncoming, fluorescent doom.

He really didn't like this…

Jobe's hand found itself slowly inching towards the gun that resided in his belt, even though it would probably do more damage if he threw it at whatever had transfixed Virgil.

And then, of course, all hell broke lose.

Without warning, Virgil sprung into life as an echoing splash came rumbling through the tunnel after her as she bolted towards Jobe. She skidded to a halt, sending a spray of the foul water into the air as she nearly collided with him. One of those sickly, bandaged hands shot out and locked around his wrist like a vice and for a brief second, Jobe feared the sound of cracking bone might come splintering from it.

"Run and don't look back." Her face loomed in front of his as Virgil exhaled the warning in one fluid breath. She took off, practically dragging Jobe with her for the first few steps before her hand slipped away, leaving him to fall flat on his ass. From this new perspective, he was able to witness their pursuer come skidding past the corner Virgil had been standing at only seconds before. It slammed into the opposite wall with the force of a freight train, sending a small tremor up the tunnel.

_'That thing's HUGE!'_ Just catching a glimpse of the creature was enough to get Jobe moving again. He scrambled to his feet as it let out a bestial cry of either frustration or pain pulling itself from the wall, taking most of the plaster with it. Its war cry filled the tunnel as the confined space amplified the horse roar. Jobe slammed his hands over his ears in a vain attempt to block the sound out as he ran head long up the tunnel. With blind faith, he chased the ever-fading shadow that was Virgil but the distance between the two was slowly growing.

Their pursuer had begun to move again, at slow lope at first but it quickly began to speed up until it was pounding after them at a crazy tempo. To Jobe, it sounded as though he was being chased by a small elephant that was bent on tearing him apart. 

To his horror, Jobe found that he was starting to have trouble keeping his pace. The sound of his ragged breathing filled his ears the shoulder that Greed had sunk its fangs into was begging to throb like a heart beat. The muscles in his legs were starting to tire and he'd lost all sight of Virgil. In the darkness, the passage appeared to stretch on forever, offering no means of escape.

Up ahead, a crease split the shadow like a tiny cut. At first, Jobe dismissed it as his over tiered and under fed brain finally cracking under the strain of all the insanity around him but the line of dim light refused to disappear. On the country, it was growing wider.

'It's that legendary light at the end of the tunnel…' 

Jobe would have laughed if it weren't for the fact he was being chased by a hundred and ten pounds of rabid meat that was quickly gaining on him. His calves were now screaming at him to stop and the pain in his shoulder was almost blinding. He could feel the hot, sticky breath of his pursuer condensing on his neck into a heavy blanket of moisture. Jobe closed his eyes, trying to prepare himself for searing pain as it lunged at him, impaling him with unimaginable, long claws. Instead, there was an enormous crash as the gargantuan creature lost its footing on the slick floor, collapsing into the dingy water that seemed to flood the tunnel with noise.

Jobe didn't dare look back to see what had befallen it and used the last of his strength to put on an extra burst of speed. The crease of light had expanded into a rectangle as Jobe neared the open door. His foot caught on the step that rose out of the water, sending him sprawling threw it and brought him to the floor. He lay there, desperately trying to refill his wheezing lungs. He didn't care that his face was lying in a thin layer of crusty grime or his cloths were being slowly soaked, he was safe. If he ever had to run again, it was to soon.

"Are you going to lye there all day or are you going to help me?!"

Virgil's stretched voice filled his head, bringing him crashing back to reality. He sat up to see the girl struggling with the heavy iron door that stood between and their pursuer, who was drawing closer with every second.

Jobe jumped to his feet, nearly slipping on the slick tiles as he rushed to join her.

"Glad to see you up and about!" Virgil grunted through gritted teeth as she pressed her shoulder to the door that was closing far to slowly. Jobe glanced out of it as he helped push it too.

"Oh shit! That things going to be in here any second."

"Really?!" came the sarcastic retort as she fought with the door.

The door finally gave, grinding shut. Virgil barged past Jobe, pushing him aside as she rushed to the over-sized bolt and went to push it. She'd barely laid a hand on it when the door erupted. 

The bolt was ripped free as the creature threw itself at it, obviously not bothering to slow down as it approached the end of the tunnel. The pair were sent flying as the door was torn from its hinges and landed painfully on the less than forgiving floor. Virgil felt the wind rush out of her, leaving the girl lay on the floor gasping like a fish. Wincing she brought her head up, she took her first good look at the creature and hoped (not prayed, she'd given up on that road a long time ago) that it wasn't what she thought it was.

She obviously must have done something to piss fate off.

"What the FUCK is that thing?" Came the cry from Jobe as he struggled to his feet, wide eyed as he tried to comprehend the unspeakably horror that stood before them.

"It's a centaur…" She trailed off as she slowly prepared herself for the imminent conflict that was going to be neither pretty, nor pain-free. 

To Jobe's mind, the word centaur conjured up images of mystical half horse, half man creatures that inhabited ancient Greek literature.

He could see where Virgil drew her inspiration from when coming up for a name but he was dammed if these things were frolicking about in Athenian forests.

 Its sides scraped the doorframe, as it tried to force its way in which wasn't helped by the fact the centaur was the size of a small car. It looked like a lion that had been skinned and pumped with enough steroids to make Arnold Schwarzenegger blush. Almost all the flesh was missing from its over sized head but a pair of dull eyes rolled wildly in a sunken pool of sagging skin. The centaur's powerful jaw snapped angrily at the pray that dared to deify it, displaying to Jobe's dismay, a set of teeth that reminded him of a bear trap. Strands of thick, viscose saliva clung to its fangs like runny chewing gum.

Due to the lack of skin on the beast, Jobe could see the fibres of large muscles in the beast's leg contract and strain as it forced one of its shoulders into the room, bringing with it a paw armed with clever-like claws that stuck out at weird angles. He felt his stomach turn to water when he saw that one of them turned back on itself, impaling its foot. The creature seemed oblivious to the wound as pus lined it, becoming a raised, furious blister.

He'd begun to slowly backing away from the monstrosity that was trying to drag itself through a door to small for it. He managed to catch his balance as the floor disappeared from underneath his foot as he slid it further back. He snapped his head over his shoulder and felt the small flutter of hope that had kept him going crumple.

"We're trapped." He uttered flatly as he stared at what lay behind him. Jobe hadn't noticed the sound of rushing sewage before but now it came all to clearly like a mocking laugh.

The tiles fell away to form a pool that stretched out to the other side of the room. At first glace, you could be mistaken to believe that you could walk across its surface as it was so stagnant. Little colourful swirls of oil speckled the thin brown crust that lay across the still, dead water like a rotten epidermis, only braking where sewage cascaded down in a mini waterfall from a rusting pipe. 

A wave of panic rose up in him as he turned back to the wailing freak. It had managed to get a second leg through the door but still seemed to be struggling, not caring if it injured itself on the jagged doorway. Jobe was surprised that it still couldn't fit, now that its wide shoulders (which were now covered in weeping scratches due to the centaur's forcible entry) were in the room. When he saw the problem, Jobe truly knew where Virgil had got the idea for its name. 

There was a lump on its back that Jobe first thought was some hideous tumour, constructed from taunt muscles and flaps of decaying skin. The mass of flesh was so large that the centaur was having trouble dragging it through the door. It let out a whine as the beast violently pulled itself through and suddenly, there seemed to be a lot less space in the already tiny room. No longer constricted by the doorway, Jobe was able to see the quivering hump of flesh that he had mistook for a growth in all its hideous glory.

It was as if a man was growing up from the centre of the creatures back. The waist that connected the two entities was little more than a mass of that fibre like strands, giving it an anorexic look. The bones of its rib cage were clearly visible underneath thinly stretched skin and there were deep, empty hollows under its collarbones. The head appeared to have been flash fried, as all its features were lost in a mass of contorted skin, all except for the mouth. The head seemed to share its other half's oversize teeth. They were to large to be contained by its mouth, protruding from writhing lips that made wet noises as they ran over its dentures. In one place, a canine like fang had punctured the lip like some bizarre piercing, and remerged from the flesh.

Its arms trailed limply down to the floor, coming to an end just above it and swayed lifelessly. The ends of the over long appendages seemed to have ballooned up into huge swellings of corrupt skin and fluid. Their structure looked like some living pendulum as they moved back and forth at a hypnotic tempo.

While Jobe just goggled at horror (We must remember that the most terrifying thing to him a few hours ago was the wrath of his girlfriend if he didn't call) at the behemoth. Mean while, Virgil had swung the shotgun from where it rested across her back. Jobe was snapped back to reality when the familiar 'chu chck' of the weapon being cocked reached his ears. He'd watched enough movies to know what was coming next.

Virgil raised the firearm, aiming down the long barrel of the gun although in the small space, she probably didn't need to worry too much about missing.

**'BOOM!'**

The shot tore trough the air, drowning out the centaur's cries. In the small space, it sounded more as though some one had let off a small bomb in the room as the explosion resonated from the weapon. Jobe flinched, his hands slammed down on his ears in some self-preservation reaction.

The after echo of the blast became nothing more than background noise as the centaur's piercing scream rose in volume, with a sound like electrical interference. The tiny metal balls had peppered the bestial head and blood seemed to ooze, dripping from countless wounds. At such short range, most things would have been reduced to a mass of gore or a stain on the wall but the centaur's skull was thicker than Oxford's English Dictionary. It was going to take a lot more than a bullet or two to penetrate the many layers of bone.

The beast howled and lurched towards the pair, its top half threw itself back, dragging one of its wrecking ball fists back with it as it picked up momentum.

Jobe took a step back as the creature stumbled towards him, gnashing its great fangs at him. He didn't see the fist coming at him until it was to late. From the corner of his eye, he registered the mass of tan and off-white looming up but by the time he'd turned his head, the fist smacked into him with the force of a bulldozer. Jobe felt his feet leave the ground the living sack carried him up for a moment before the laws of physics took over and he collided with a wall, hitting it hard enough to send a wave of pain to every nerve. He was barely aware of slumping back to the floor as the world swam about him, shifting in and out of focus. He felt as though he'd gone a hundred rounds with Mohammad Ali  

Virgil watched in horror as Jobe smacked into the wall, back first. There was no way of shooting at the centaur now without hitting the now motionless man as it prowled towards him, towering triumphantly over the figure that lay crumpled on the floor.

Her hands fell away from the shotgun and locked on to the kantana's hilt. With a violent yank, the wicked blade was free of its scabbard and she was running towards the beast that was already getting ready to pummel into Jobe with its gargantuan fists.

This was probably going to be as successful as taking on a tank with a peashooter, but then, she'd been in much uglier situations than this.

Part 2: Revelation

Jobe felt something warm seeping through his closed eyelid as it refused to open.

'Not like it matters…' 

He could see well enough with just one. The centaur dwarfed him, like some living monolith. Even if he couldn't see, he'd know it was standing inches away from him just from the smell. The thing reeked of damp. When Jobe's brother had shot that dog, he'd pleaded with his little brother to help him hide it. The only reason why he'd agreed to help Samson was because his brother was cold enough to threaten Jobe with blackmail. So the two boys hid the dog under the porch. It was only a few weeks later when that horrible stench of rot and decomposition began to waft up from underneath the house that they were discovered.

When Jobe's father could no longer stand the repulsive odder, he had pulled up the wooden planks that made up the porch. The smell of the corpse hit the man like a heat wave, Jobe remembered all to well how he'd gone running down the steps that lead to the house cursing till he was blue in the face.

The snarling abomination smelt just like the explosion of gasses that escaped when the wooden planks were ripped away by his inquisitive father.

He tried to shy away from it as the centaur stood motionless, staring at him with those vindictive eyes. Waiting for the final blow was even worse than receiving it. From where Jobe lay, he could see the muscles in the human like growth tense up as it prepared to swing one of its mammoth arms into him.

A roar tore through the air, but despite its inhuman tone, it did not originate from the centaur.

Virgil landed on its spindly back and somehow managed to keep her balance. Both heads turned, a look of surprise was almost visible on the more humane. The girl continued to scream as she let the sword fly in a smooth arc, interrupted only by the spindly neck of the less monstrous face.

Jobe heard the sleek grate of metal as the blade severed tissue and bone before the kantana remerged from the other side of its neck.

Yet still the beast stood and time seemed to stop as it stared at Virgil.

That was, until the head tumbled from stopping shoulders, hitting the floor with a wet smack as a geyser of blood spurted from the point where it had, just moments before, been attached to its body.

A scream of pain erupted from its huge mouth, shattering the stillness that had enveloped the room like fog.  

The arms of the stalk like growth thrashed weakly, but due to their horrendous weight, that was all they could do. The centaur screamed again but this one was filled with an uncontrollable fury and it bucked violently. Virgil ducked, grabbing a fistful of the saggy flesh of the creature's back in a desperate attempt not to be flung into the nearest wall. Jobe was barely able to roll out of the way as the over-sized freak of nature ploughed into the wall, oblivious to whatever damage it was causing to itself. The beast grated along the rough tiled surface, many of the ancient ceramic slabs were torn free as they caught on its side.

Jobe watched in horror as it charged like a mad dog towards the stagnant pool while Virgil still clung to the centaur's back. He truly believed that the pair would go flying from the ledge and into the murky water as the distance between the centaur and the pool's edge rapidly closed but it was not to be. Despite its tremendous mass, their tormentor was able to stop on a dime, skidding to a halt on the slick floor. With a cry of surprise more than anything, Virgil was torn from the centaur as the rag of decomposing flesh was ripped free and she went flying over its drooped head.

Unable to do a damn thing, Jobe watched as the girl was propelled through the air before smacking into the water and was swallowed by the stinking mass. The only evidence of her short flight was the black hole in the water's crust and the ripples that lazily expanded from it.

For a moment, the over-sized monstrosity looked at the water in fascination before snapping its dumb gaze onto Jobe who had now risen to his feet, a look of sheer loss plastered across his visage. It hung there for only a moment before rage clouded over it like a storm. He was sick of being chased and hunted like an animal. Seeing the hungry look in the centaur's eyes just pushed him over the edge and his fear was consumed by the desire to cause whatever the hell it was in front of him some pain.

"Hey fuck-face, you hungry?"

It laboriously turned and lowered its head in preparation to charge. This little creature was beginning to become a pain. 

"Chomp on this!"

As the centaur leaped towards him, Jobe pulled the gun free from his belt and began to fire wildly. A volley of bullets rained down on their target, digging themselves deep into the beasts's skull. One whizzed past its head, taking a strip of skin with it. By sheer luck, one managed to find the creature's fleshy throat, tearing through tendons like paper.

Its war cry shrank to a strangulated warble as the centaur lost its footing while a bullet carved its way through its brain. Even though the centaur's journey had been a short one, it still had enough momentum to hit Jobe like a speeding car. He dived out the way as the mass of flesh and muscle slammed into the wall with a bone-splitting crack as its hardy skull splintered on impact.

Jobe gasped, taking deep gulps of air as he watched the centaur's hind legs feebly paw at the ground before finally giving up and collapsing in a heap. The adrenalin rush was starting to die down, replaced by a deep repetitive thud in his ears and…

"VIRGIL!"

He ran to the water's side, calling her name but the only answer he received was from his distorted reflection and the never-ending spillage of water from the rusting metal pipe.

Was this all Silent Hill was good for, inflicting loss after loss upon him? He felt like screaming until the flesh of his throat became raw but somehow, he just didn't have it in him.

The water beneath his feet exploded in a torrent of muck and sewage, soaking his already sodden trousers and something threw itself most of itself on to the ground. Violent coughing erupted from her mouth as Virgil began slipping back into the murky water. For a second, Jobe was too dumbfounded by her entrance and almost let her torso fall back into the pool. He grabbed one of her arms, pulling the choking figure to their feet but she instantly collapsed again in a fit of retches, still clutching the kantana. From the way she was going, it sounded as though she was going to cough up her lungs. Her body heaved and there was a wet splat as Virgil vomited the contense of her stomach on to the already filthy floor, Jobe would have been more than happy to help but he had no idea how she'd take it.

Finally, the coughing subsided and Virgil shakily rose to her feet. Her clothes sagged, hanging of her and giving the girl the appearance of a drowned rat.

"Are you going to be_"

The words died in Jobe's throat. Virgil's hood had fallen, plastered to her back under the weight of stagnant water and what it revealed was disturbing to saw the least.

Scar tissue corrupted every inch of skin in long white strands, and the skin itself looked as though it had died. It had gone a pale shade of its former colour and almost all her characteristics were lost in a sea of charred flesh. More of those bandages ran across Virgil's face, strapped over the sharp bridge of her nose and travelling up towards her eye before it was obscured from view by an untidy fringe of black hair that flopped lifelessly over her face. The other eye stared at Jobe; it was the colour of off milk. The colouring of the iris had faded into its pale backdrop but the pupil was still as sharp as ever.

Jobe barely had time to notice other details (how frayed and greasy the hair that framed her face was and how the skin on the left nostril had been all but burnt off, giving the already starved face a skeletal look) before a spark of suspicion shot across the lone eye. A hand darted up to her face and the suspicion instantly dissolved into horror.

Jobe snapped his gaze away, becoming completely absorbed by the filth-flooded cracks that ran between the tiles but the damage was already done.

"Don't look at me!" Virgil seemed to fold in upon herself as she cried; her already damaged voice grated with stress. Jobe took a step forward and was about to offer a word of comfort but slunk further back, so fast that she nearly tripped over her own feet.

"No, please don't_" Virgil raised her arms, as if to ward off a blow and it dawned on Jobe that she was actually afraid, no petrified of him.

"I'm not going to hurt you." He offered in what he hoped was his most reassuring tone as he place his gun back in the belt. Virgil's arms lowered somewhat and he saw that distorted eye peer at him between her ragged fingers. The pupil had dilated to the size of a pinhead in the dazing glaze of the torch.

"Why would I want to anyway?"

"The others did…" Jobe felt his brows knit together.

"What others?"

Virgil's arm's dropped to her side, the hands locked into angry fists.

"Every one! And don't think you're the first person to come wondering into this town that I've tried to help,"

Jobe notice the fists were starting to shake violently. Her head stayed fixed on a spot on the floor as the words were spat from her mouth. "But when they see me for what I am, they think I'm no better than one of them!" She pointed vehemently at the bloody corpse of the centaur that lay motionless where it smashed into the wall. "They think I'm some kind of monster. _That's_ why I can't leave, because I belong here with them!" She practically screamed the last words, taking deep, shaky breaths through teeth clenched so tightly together that they could shatter like crystal.

"But your not." Jobe's words seemed to harder than the centaur ever could, and for the first time, she looked at him face on. She tried to say something but quickly thought against it.

"Your nothing like those," Jobe gestured towards the crumpled body. "Hell, you save my life. That makes you just as human as me."

"Y-you aren't disgusted by me?"

"No." That wasn't entirely true and that made Jobe feel all the more hypocritical.

Virgil shifted her weight from one foot to another uncomfortably, like an embarrassed child.

"Sorry…" She pulled the hood up, hiding that horrible mask of bandages and warped skin.

"Don't be. Now," He began in a completely fresh tone, trying to forget how he felt. "How do we get out of here?"

It wasn't that he despised Virgil for what she was. He pitied her and he hated himself for that. He didn't believe in that felling, that you felt your self higher than someone else and in the position to look down on them, whish they weren't what they were.

But here he was doing that right now and every time he looked at the ragged ghost of a human that was Virgil, he felt that deep sense of pity.

He'd wanted to know what was behind the Veil, and now that it had been revealed, there was no way he could ignore it.

================

Mmmm, you see that button there, isn't it so nice and shiny? Don't you just want to press it? Go on, you know you want to.

   ****


	13. Of ghosts and gods

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has reviewed this story and I'm glad to see that most of you are enjoying it. I would also like to welcome Starstealer (forgive me if I miss spell your name) back and advise everyone of you to go read her fic if you want to read a good Silent Hill story.

This was going to be longer but after the last chapter, I didn't have it in me. Still, it's long enough, I hope.

Chapter 12: Of Ghosts and Gods

It would be nice to say that Jobe's first breath of fresh air was a truly refreshing, born again experience that purified his lungs of the stale rancid air of Silent Hill's sewage system. Sadly, it was anything but.

The bedraggled Jobe clambered out from the manhole that Virgil had (quite forcibly) pulled free in to the pale, grey-lit street. Almost smiling, he brought himself to his full height and stretched, breathing deeply to help erase the stench of the underground passageways from his mind.

He stopped mid-inhalation.

Sure, the air smelt much purer up here but there was an underlying hint of the rotting odour that his brain could barely register, but it was there. It seemed that the whole town had been touched by the greasy fingers of corruption, spreading out from its rotten core.

He felt eyes upon him.

Jobe stopped and looked at Virgil who had frozen like a statue, intently watching Jobe as she pushed the manhole back into position. Not like there was anyone around to fall into the uncovered hole.

A mild "What?" Was all Jobe could manage in response as his mind slowly came back to the plane of reality it should have been on.

Her gaze quickly snapped away, back to the rusting metal disk.

"Nothing, I-I…" she trailed off, ending her mumbled sentence with something that sounded suspiciously like sorry as she turned her attention back to pushing the manhole cover back over the hole. A squeaking rumble echoed up the lonely street, the noise sounding so alien as the heavy iron cover was dragged over the gravel.

Ever since the incident with the centaur, she hadn't said a word. Not that this was any different from normal but the silence that hung between them had been a painful one and she begun to apologise for everything profusely. Any attempt at making conversation had failed painfully.

Jobe lifted his gaze form the still dripping girl and looked up the road they'd emerged on. Clouds of milky fog billowed and twirled in a sharp breeze that cut through his damp clothes like a knife. The temperature felt as though it had dropped another ten degrees since the last time he had been outside. Jobe wrapped his arms around his body, trying to ignore the fact it had started to snow. Small watery flakes fell from the sky, but quickly vanished as soon as they kissed the concrete ground.

"Snow in August, this place is just full of surprises." Jobe commented sullenly as he watched the sleet like precipitation seep through the green material of his shirt.

Virgil sat back on her hunches, having finished her self appointed task.

"It's always like this here," She let out a sad, half-hearted attempt of a laugh. "I haven't seen the sun for such a long time now…" The girl looked up to the threatening grey sky that seemed low enough to touch for a brief moment before signalling for Jobe to come join her.

He squatted down by Virgil as she produced one of those resalable plastic bags from a pocket that looked ready to come free of her trousers.

"Where would this friend of yours have gone?" Jobe watched with that lethal curiosity of his as she opened the bag up and produced a small fold of yellowing paper and carefully began to unfold it.

"Phil used to live here, so I guess he'd go back home but if he's in as bad a state as I think he is, He would have headed to the nearest hospital."

Underneath the hood, Virgil's good eye twitched,

 '_That would be bad, VERY bad'_

And paused for a second before lying out the now A5 sized piece of paper on the ground. Jobe silently ran his eyes over what appeared to be a dog-eared map of Silent Hill. Jagged black lines ran across its surface, making up streets and buildings labelled with untidy writing that was so small, Jobe had trouble decoding it.

He hadn't realised how big the town was before. Jobe's heart sank in his chest when he saw there was a huge lake that divided the two half's of the town, and both looked way to large to find someone in. There was one feature that stuck out like a sore thumb and always seemed to just be in the corner of Jobe's eye as he let them run over the details of the map. 

At the end of one of the many identical streets, there was a furious scribble. The lines raced furiously over the page, in some places tearing the fragile, yellow parchment as they tried to blot out whatever had been written. Underneath, in that illegible script, it was merely labelled as _'the dark place'_ that did nothing to remove the veil of ambiguity.

Jobe was just about to open his mouth to ask about it but Virgil beat him to it.

"Do you know where he lived?" Her voice creaked softly from under the hood.

"Phil wasn't exactly open about his past," Virgil turned to Jobe and in the faint, distilled light, he could make out that distorted eye of hers squint in frustration. "But he did tell me he used to live in an apartment. Does that help?" Glancing at the map, Jobe realised that just under half of the residential buildings were flats. In an attempt to redeem himself, Jobe tried again. "Look, why don't we check out the hospital first…"

Her hand came down violently on the map as she scooped it up and began folding it away.

"That place is on the other side of the lake, we should try this side first." Jobe was surprised to hear how clam her voice sounded after that small display but it sounded so forced. It was as clear as day (well, maybe not in the case of Silent Hill) that there was something worrying her.

"You should keep a hold of this," As Virgil rose; she held the once again tiny fold of paper out for him, beckoning for him to take it. Cautiously, Jobe reached out for it.

"Why? You aren't planning on running of and leaving me, are you?" He meant it in jest, but Virgil seemed to visibly cower at his words, as if Jobe was pointing a finger at her and screaming the accusation for all the world to hear.

"No! I-I just…" The girl stuttered and tripped over the words as she tried to justify herself as fast as she could. "It far to easy to get lost in this town, that's all."

"I didn't mean it like that."

"Oh," The moment Jobe's fingers locked onto the parchment, her hand fell heavily to her side where the fingers twitched uncomfortably. "Sorry…"

The silence around them invaded the conversation, filling it with an awkward quietness that seemed impossible to break. After what felt like a painfully long time, Jobe finally wrenched himself from the dream like state that had fallen over the noiseless street.

"It's as cold as hell out here, we should make a move before you turn into an ice sculpture." He murmured, staring at the waterlogged jumper. Virgil shifted uncomfortably under his gaze turning towards the end of the road and still in that awful silence; the two began their misty pilgrimage into the town.

*   *   *

Jobe was beginning to lose any sense of direction he'd had. Every street they turned onto was practically identical to the last; all were lined by squat, unimpressive and neglected houses with the occasional convenience store or bar. The few apartment buildings they'd come upon had all been locked from the inside, with doors that stubbornly refused to budge. Jobe had tried to smash his way into one with the lead pipe but even though he'd given it his all, the melee weapon merely bounced harmlessly off the peeling wooden surface, taking a few flake of paints with it.

"You aren't going to get in that way." Virgil observed as she watched without interest from the bottom of the small flight of wooden steps that lead up to the apartment's entrance. Jobe turned, still flushed and let the metal pole drop limply to his side.

"Why the hell is every thing in this god damn town locked? It's not like there's anyone around to care if someone breaks into their house!" He gave the door one final slug, the hollow sound resonating through the murky air with a dull thud, before joining Virgil.

"Be thankful, it's one less place we have to search."

  He'd barely caught her before Virgil took off, walking at such brisk a pace that Jobe had to jog to keep up with her.

The houses on either side of them disappeared into the ever-thickening mist, becoming little more than shadows. Jobe hated this lack of visibility, he wouldn't have known if there was anything on the street until he'd practically run into its open arms (or mouth or whatever the next monstrosity they ran into was armed with). However, fate seemed to have decided to let Jobe and his slightly unbalanced guide have a break from the norm that was Silent Hill. Since they'd embarked on this odyssey to find an unlocked door, which was not proving to be an easy feat, they hadn't bumped into anything intent on eating them.

Virgil turned onto yet another road. To Jobe, the only difference between this one and the last was that it was even foggier and decrepit than the previous street. If it wasn't for her, Jobe was sure he would have become lost in seconds, whilst Virgil seemed to be able to navigate the town so effortlessly. It was as if someone had painted a bright, fluorescent line that only she could see.

"Virgil?"

"Mmm?" Came the absent minded response.

"Who's Alessa?" During the course of his stay in the town, Jobe had heard references to the girl and met her once very briefly (although she seemed far from sociable). Plus, it was an excuse for conversation.

"Where did you hear that name?" Jobe wasn't sure if the best way to answer a question was with another but at least Virgil was talking again.

"I think that Claudia woman mentioned her…" This, of course was a lie but Jobe really didn't feel like talking about that dream again and he'd sound as mad as a hatter.

"Figures…" 

"How so?"

"She's the first person who mentioned Alessa to me as well." Jobe stopped and suddenly found that he felt extremely uncomfortable as Virgil continued to talk.

"When Claudia told me about her, she made it sound as though this Alessa was some sort of higher power, that she would save man-kind and create some utopia where we would live happily ever after."

"That sounds like Claudia alright." Virgil ignored the interruption and carried on.

"Anyway, the second time I heard about Alessa was in the library on the other side of the river."

"What were you doing there?"

"I became curious about the towns history…" Jobe shot her a sceptical look. "What? It's not like there's a lot to do around here and the locals aren't exactly friendly."

Jobe grinned at the last comment and fell silent.

"Any way, there's one of those old newspaper archives that goes all the way back to the nineteen hundreds. About twenty four years ago, a little girl was killed when her house burnt to the ground_"

"Let me guess, our friend Alessa?"

"You're catching on. For a while, the authorities suspected her mother, Dahlia Gillespie, had locked the girl in the house and torched it, but they didn't press any charges. The next time I heard about her was in the hospital. I was in the basement looking for…medical supplies. I managed to get myself lost and ended up is some treatment room. The strange thing was that there was only one bed down there and according to the chart, its occupant had been a miss. Gillespie."

Jobe broke in.

"What's so odd about that? It could have been her mother for all you know, or Alessa could have been there before."

"The chart started the day after the fire and it was for a major burns victim. The newspapers and hospital files said that Alessa died in that fire but she didn't. She was being kept alive down there, not that whoever decided to do it tried to help her get better. They just left her down in that basement for seven years."

Virgil cut off abruptly, grabbing her throat. Her mangled voice box wasn't used to doing so much work in such a long time.

"Are you ok?" Jobe asked cautiously but his concern was dismissed by a wave of Virgil's hand.

"P_perfectly…fi_fine." Came the choked answer, reminding Jobe of the guy who fell down the stairs and insisted that he was all right, even if he'd clearly broken his leg.

"So who come Alessa didn't die if she wasn't receiving any medical attention?"

Virgil released her throat from the rough grip she had it in and looked sadly at Jobe.

"A god can't die."

Jobe was so stunned by the depressed remark that he actually forgot to walk and almost tripped over his feet.

"What? Are you trying to tell me that this girl is…" For a moment he couldn't bring himself to say it, the whole thing seemed so ridiculous. "…God?"

"Well that's what Claudia and the others believe."

"What other's" He was starting to become annoyed with his own ignorance. For every question he asked, it felt as though another hundred could follow it up. Virgil visibly flinched at the sound of his raised voice, looking at him as though he could blow up any second.

"Well, from what I gather, there seems to be some sort of cult that operates in this town…"

Jobe didn't hear the rest, letting the rest of Virgil's words wash over him. This tale of ghosts and gods that she was weaving was all too unreal, but then again, this town seemed to revel in the unreal.

_'Could it be true that god could be found here, in the last place I'd expect to look?'_

Then he saw.

Virgil was in the middle of explaining the cult's perverse beliefs when she walked straight into Jobe's outstretched hand. She looked at him, about to ask what she'd done wrong with him but froze when she saw the look on his face.

"Look!" 

She followed the direction of his out stretched finger, tracing the invisible line it drew to the pavement.

There on the tar-mack, for all the world to see was a lone, dragged and bloody foot print

+++++++++++

Oh, que the dramatic music!

BTW, my geography of Silent Hill is all screwed up so if anyone has a full map of the town, could you possibly drop me an e-mail, it would be greatly appreciated.

  __


	14. Falling Appart

Gah, this took way to long to write, damn writter's block! By the way, if you go to my profile (which really isn't anything to write home about) there's a link to some art work that goes with this story so feel free to check it out.

This too was going to be a lot longer but I really didn't want another 5-page saga. Oh, and happy holidays everyone! 

Chapter 13: Falling apart 

Jobe threw himself to his knees fast enough to break them in his rush to inspect the tarnished red stain, not even noticing as the layer of melted snow on the pavement soaked through his trousers.

A bemused Virgil watched as he bent over the mark, scanning it intensely as if it was some work of art. When Jobe threw back his head and let out gleeful laugh, she really began to worry.

"Wha-?"

"It's Phil!" He looked up at her, grinning from ear to ear and pointing at the stain that apparently was his friend. She leaned over his shoulder and squinted at the stain that was already begging to run, diffusing over the wet tarmac in small red veins but it was clearly shoe-shaped.

"But how can you tell? It looks like any old foot-print."

"It's the same as the one's leading away from the car." Jobe found his voice rising uncontrollably with excitement. "Anyway, who else could it be? Last time I checked, Claudia didn't seem to believe in shoes." Virgil shifted uncomfortably at his retort, which seemed to be radiating uncensored joy. 

Jobe rose to his feet and looked up the street in the direction of the bloody streak. He could just about make out another one a few feet away, quickly taking off in its direction but stopped after taking only a few steps and looked over his shoulder.

Virgil had stayed rigidly rooted to the spot, staring longingly in the direction they had been previously heading.

"Virgil?"

Her head snapped round at the sound of her appointed name.

"Huh?"

Jobe found himself frowning; why was she being so apprehensive? She knew just as well as he did that Phil could be in serious trouble, judging from the footprint, and they didn't have enough time to stand about doing nothing.

"You are coming, right?"

"Of course, it's just that…well…" She raised a hand, silencing herself and killing the disintegrating sentence. "Sorry, I'm just babbling. We should get a move on."

Jobe nodded, not a hundred percent sure that she wasn't keeping something from him, and if so why? Silently, Virgil submissively fell into line behind him and became nothing more than his shadow.

*   *   *

The footprints had become fainter with each fresh mark and already Jobe was having trouble making them out against the dark backdrop of the tarmac.

"Jobe?"

The man stopped and turned around, there was something in Virgil's voice that set of Jobe's internal alarms. It sounded so…so drained and even more void of life than usual.

"What's wrong?" When he saw her, the alarm when into overdrive.

Virgil seemed to have collapsed in upon herself, barely able to support her frame.

"We-we can't go this way." Her head had drooped onto her chest, obscuring the already hidden face from view.

It took a few second for her words to sink in.

"What?! Why not? We have to!"

"We just can't" Jobe was silenced by the harshness in her tone as she laboriously raised her head. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed that one of her hands was twitching violently, randomly locking and unlocking into a balled fist.

Despite these warning signs, Jobe found that he could not just take no for an answer.

"What the hell kind of justification is that? I didn't come so far just to turn back when we're getting close!"

"Please Jobe, you don't want to do-"

"Just tell me why?!" Jobe found himself unable to keep a leash on his voice as it rose in volume, causing Virgil to plaster her hands over her ears as though someone had sounded a foghorn in them.

"You couldn't understand. Youuuuu**UUARRRRRRRRGHH!!!!"**

Whatever she was going to say was lost in the scream of pain that erupted from Virgil's mouth as she threw her head back, emptying her cry into the heavens.

Jobe watched in mute horror as the girl bent double forcing her palms into her temples in some wild attempt to smother the blinding agony that had spontaneously consumed her.

Jobe took a step forward but Virgil only staggered back drunkenly, moaning incomprehensibly as the distance between them closed.

"Don't…please" She held out one of her hands in a feeble attempt to hold Jobe at bay. A menacing, red stain stared back at him from the now saturated bandages at the centre of Virgil's palm, successfully stopping Jobe in his tracks.

"Oh God…" was all he managed to mutter as another tarnished stain had begun to slowly spread out from her shoulder, warping the colour of the faded jumper with greedy crimson fingers.

Jobe really wasn't sure what the hell he could do to help the spontaneously hemoriging Virgil but he wasn't going to watch her bleed to death, despite her protest.

He reached out to Virgil in some attempt to do…well something, trying to ignore the primal growl building up in her throat as he tentivly drew closer. Maybe if he hadn't been transfixed on that deep, menacing blot of deep red, he would have noticed Virgil's had fly to the kantana, sutily loosening it from its mangy scabbard.

It all happened so fast; his eyes barely had time to register the harsh flash of silver as the blade slice through the air, drawing a deep groove across Jobe's outstretched palm.

He yelped in pain, withdrawing his hand as though he'd accidentally grabbed a hot piece off metal and staggered backwards, whatching in horror as crimson blood flowed freely from the cut.

"What the hell_" Jobe looked up and whatever he was going to say got lost between his throat and lips when he saw the look on Virgil's face.

"DON'T _YOU_ TOUCH ME!"

She held the sword pointing directly at him, its tip quivering as the girl breathed shakily. The hood had fallen back and her cracked lips were warped in a vicious sneer, revealing surprisingly white teeth. Jobe felt himself sinking back under the glare, filled with hate and disgust and for a second, he was convinced that Virgil lop of his head with that horribly sharp blade. Without warning, Virgil's eyes lost their dark intensity and the murderous look dropped from her face, replaced by one of sheer fear.

"No! I didn't mean to _I- I'm so sorry," She pleaded with Jobe as he regarded her with dumbfound confusion. "I can't go this way, and there's no way I can get you to turn back, is there?" She began talking hurriedly to her self more than to Jobe. "I told you this town dose things to people, it gets them and it's going to start getting to you too."

Jobe watched as she lifted the shotgun from her shoulder before tossing the long, metal cylinder to him. He looked from the weapon to the girl in confusion as he caught it awkwardly.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm sorry Jobe, I just can't do this. Just get out of here, please." She turned to leave but was halted by a cry from Jobe.

"Wait! You can't just leave me here! What the hell just happened to you?"

She sighed heavily; her back seemed to deflate as she forced the air from her lungs.

"It's this place," Virgil's voice was beginning to slowly disintegrate, becoming more forced with each word. "I'm sorry, please don't hate me for this…but I'll understand if you do." and with that, she sprinted off into the fog, leaving Jobe alone on the street, to numb to feel the stabbing pain in his hand.

He stood for what felt like an age, trying to make sense of what had just happened. The look of malice and resent Vigil had given him burnt fresh in his mind; it was as if he'd been a whole different person in her eyes.

"This town gets to people…" Jobe ran over Virgil's parting words and was sure he'd just seen a fine example of what she meant.

The slow throb in Jobe's hand brought him painfully back to reality of his situation:

He was alone again, soaked to the bone, and his one and only companion had turned out to be the stuff physiologists dreamt of.

'Well, I can either spend all day reminiscing about this and catch my death in this snow, or I can do something constructive.'

Jobe was about turn his back on the seen when something shimmered in the corner of his eye. Where Virgil had stood lay the small, resalable plastic bag that her hand drawn map called home.

As he bent to pick it up, Jobe saw a small, blue box that also must have resided in one of Virgil's pockets.

"Oh you're really spoiling me now!"

On closer inspection, the box revealed itself to be shotgun ammo. Grinning, Jobe placed the sodden box in one of his pockets, but paused before letting the map join it. Seeing as he had it out, he might as well see where he was.

Using the entrance of a nearby 'happy burger' fast food joint as shelter, Jobe unfolded the map as his frozen fingers battled with the sheet, flimsy with age. As everything was so precisely labelled, it didn't take the man long to locate himself and very quickly he found himself sympathising with Virgil, despite her faults.

"Well we wouldn't want this to be too easy,"

The end of the street Jobe had found himself on bore a simple label:

The dark place 

*   *   *

Jobe had barely taken five steps towards his ominous destination when he heard it, a low whine that sounded like the crackling of a crisp, dry newspaper. He cast a glance over his shoulder, but of course, there was no one there. It came again, a soft buzzing hum that seemed to be emitting from one of the neglected cars that stood dejectedly on the sidewalk. On closer inspection, it appeared that one of the stained windows had been left open, the white noise of an un-tuned radio escaping through a thin, hairline of a crack.

Jobe took a cautious step towards the automobile, leaping back in shock when its radio flared into life, belting gibberish for barely two seconds before it hushed back down to a mumble of hisses and whistles. He stumbled backwards, almost losing his footing on the slick pavement as he tried to put as much distance as possible between himself and the o so fearsome car.

"Jeeeesus!!" Jobe panted as he tried to stop his heart from tearing his chest apart. It was just a car radio, why was he getting so worked up over it? It wasn't some terrible omen of Jobe's doom.

The radio squealed in response.

Jobe curled his lip at the car and walked past it, trying to ignore the wailing cacophony as he passed the vehicle. There was only a foot between him and the car when the radio let out an ear-splitting scream and the grimy window exploded outwards in a fountain of glass.

Jobe threw his arms up as the shards of shattered crystal bit into him, slicing the already worse for wear shirt. It was when something clammy locked around his wrist in a cold grip that Jobe screamed. With a sharp yank, it brought Jobe smashing head first into the car door with a dull 'klunk' as the radio continued its relentless banshee like song. Groaning, he shook his head in an attempt to lessen the pain but it only amplified the stinging that wracked his head. Jobe managed to look up in time to see what looked like ragged tendrils of flayed skin bite deeper into his wrist before it gave another vicious pull, yowling along with the white noise as it tried to drag the floored man through the shattered window.

"Let go of me, damn it!" Jobe yelled back, frantically reaching for the handgun as the beast gave another yank, digging its moist, ragged fingers ever deeper.

Whipping the firearm out, Jobe rammed it into what he guessed was a forearm and pulled the trigger. His attacker screamed as its appendage exploded in a fountain of gore and tissue. The now limp arm slithered back through the demolished window as Jobe scrabbled away from the car, not once letting his eyes leave the dark hole.

There was a crack in the radio's ballad of nonsense and for a moment it fell quiet before a voice rose in the silence.

"So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD and afflicted Job with painful sores from the soles of his feet to the top of his head." Even though the voice was distorted with static and the occasional electrical whine, Jobe could easily recognise it.

"Phil?"

The radio offered no answers as it continued preaching.

"Then Job took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it as he sat among the ashes."

The thing inside the car began to stir; the long tendril flopped lifelessly on the car door as it slowly began to pull itself through the broken window. It landed in a lifeless heap of tinted green skin that looked as though it had been left to soak for a little too long and even from just halfway across the road, Jobe could already smell its wet, metallic odour. Slowly, the Drowned (Jobe had subconsciously named the beast) rose to its full height, stretching as if it had been cramped up for too long as the radio yammered on in the background.   

Jobe guessed that it was roughly half a foot shorter than him, standing with its back stooped almost double. The Drowned's arms hung from over built shoulders that looked to heavy for it's spindly, mal shaped bowlegs to support. The arms themselves ended in ragged slivers of its off green skin, like over long and boneless fingers.

But it was the face that really got to Jobe, or rather, the lack of it. It was just a hole in its muscular neck that was tattooed with thin, blue veins. The deep, black circle stared back at Jobe hungrily before the Drowned threw its head back and roared.

"His wife said to him, _"Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and dieeeeeeeee!"_ The voice of Phil disintegrated into a painful scream that mingled with the creature's own as it howled like a siren.

Jobe slammed his hands over his ears, trying to lock the god-awful sound out of his head as he stumbled away from it. Even with his fingers jammed in his ears, he could still hear it yowl but there was something else as well. A single word that echoed soundlessly through his mind like a broken record.

WRATH 

+++++

We all know what this means, right?


	15. Wrath

Before we begin, I feel as though I should apologise for the last chapter. It really wasn't my finest hour to say the least and I hope I can redeem my self with this. If I have time, I'll try and re-write it. Also, up to this point, it's been very slow moving. After this chapter, I promise that things will speed up so hats off to all of those who have endured the pervious 13 chapters and 1 interlude.

Chapter 14: Wrath

"Oh shit!" Jobe managed to mutter through gritted teeth, trying to ignore the searing pain that had just exploded in his forehead. 

And still the word circulated round his head in a furious pulse, threatening to tear his skull apart. Out of the corner of Jobe's eye, he could just about see the Drowned lowering its warped excuse for a head, letting its growl trail off into nothing but a vicious hiss, like gas being let out of a cylinder at a dangerously high pressure.

Jobe stumbled back, trying to raise his gun at the monstrosity but his arm just wasn't responding. All his senses had clouded over, as if the fog that polluted the air had invaded his very being.

 It regarded the staggering man for a moment before renewing its howl and lunging at him with inhuman speed, arms out starched, waiting expectantly for the lethal embrace.

But it never landed the blow.

Jobe's optic nerves barely managed to register the brown blur that came smashing down upon the Drowned like a furious angle, smashing it into the dark, tarmac surface with a sickening crack as bone and cartilage snapped. There was a low beat and Jobe felt the air rush past his face as the Drowned's attacker took off into the low hanging cloud, disappearing from sight in the blink of an eye and tacking its quarry with it.

The dullness that had enveloped Jobe's senses seemed to lift with horrifying clarity. He'd met this creature before and it had a name…

Wrath 

 Jobe looked at the spot where Wrath had slammed into the Drowned, a spot marked by a splatter of rusty blood that quickly trickled between the cracks of the road's black surface.

_'That thing must have hit it with the force of a freight train!' _ The thought flashed through his mind, along with a series of disturbing images of him befalling the same fate. With out a second though, Jobe ran in the direction of Phil's rapidly fading footprints, franticly using them as some sort of guide.

**CRUKKKKK!!**

The nearest car to Jobe seemed to implode as something fell like a rock from the sky and slammed into the car's roof. The whole thing seemed to buckle under the weight as windows cracked and their metal supports twisted like fractured bones. 

Jobe froze in his tracks when he realised what the lifeless lump that had come plummeting from the sky was.

One of the Drowned's limp arms hung over the edge of the car, a thin trickle of blood ran down the pale green limb. It was the only part of the creature that was still recognisable.

Icy fear crept over Jobe, like frost. From where he stood, he had way too good a view of what remained of the Drowned. Its tight, muscular chest had been split down the middle in a long, messy cut that stretched from its shoulder to its thigh. The diagonal cut was so deep that Jobe was sure he could see the metallic surface of the car underneath, dyed deep crimson with the Drowned's leaking blood. The rest of its flesh was covered in shallow scratches in a bleeding network. Nothing had been left unscathed by its attacker.

He wanted to run, oh god did he want to run. He wanted to tare his eyes away from the mutilated corpse and flee into some dark corner where this town would no longer be able to hunt him, and for a moment, that letter he'd found when he first came to this town flashed into his mind.

Run away 

But it had got a hold of him.

It was the beat that finally snapped Jobe out of it, the beat of leathery wings that belonged to another of this town's unspeakable spawn.

Now, Jobe ran, pumping up the street as fast as his legs could carry him to the tireless beat of a demon's wings but no matter how hard he pushed himself it was quickly gaining on him, the sound of its corrupted feathers filled his ears.

This time, running wasn't going to save him, but misfortune would. If Jobe had looked down at his feet (Which, to be honest was his last concern at this moment) he would have seen that after wadding threw sewers and walking countless miles, one of his shoelaces was finally becoming undone.

Of course, Jobe was to busy running for his life to see this. The loss, flapping thread was caught under his other shoe and he came crashing down onto the rough, and soaked tarmac. The air rushed out of his lungs as gravel scraped at his chest and pain blazed across his skull as his head bounced off the unforgiving surface. He was barely aware of the rush of air as Wrath blazed past over-head; its talon's just missed skewering Jobe's soft back as he hit the ground.

He looked up, not aware of the thin trickle of blood that flowed from his split lip, only just catching a glimpse of his the winged monstrosity before it was swallowed up by the fog.

Jobe rushed to his feet to quickly, his head spinning from an overload of adrenaline that caused his frayed nerves to buzz.

The shotgun bounced softly against Jobe's back and he gratefully grabbed it. He raised the long metal firearm; already the sound of Wrath returning filled could be heard, signalled by the long rushes of air that echoed up the empty street.

Sweat stung Jobe's grazed forehead as he waited for the beast to reveal itself in all its damned glory, the suspense seemed worse that the impending confrontation.

A blur. That was all the incentive Jobe needed to see to fire the shotgun.

**'BOOM'**

The sound cracked through the street as he pulled the trigger and the weapon roared into life. The wooden handle kicked back into his stomach, sending his muscles into a spasm and he fell back, gasping like a fish.

Wrath hurtled past him, colliding ungracefully with the pavement. It came to a halt in a screeching mass of tangled limbs several feet away from Jobe, who was desperately fumbling with the shotgun in an attempt to re-load it.

Jobe finally managed to snap the barrel open, pushing two cartages down the twin barrels with shaking hands. He looked back up as he snapped the weapon shut and quickly found himself wishing he'd taken Virgil's advice about not going this way.

The thing that stood before him made the Drowned look almost cute. Gnarled, horribly sharp teeth winked at Jobe from receding gums that grew from the creature's snout. Its deeply set eyes were the colour of faded dollar coins and the twin orbs twinkled maliciously from underneath heavy, Neanderthal brows. Jobe noted with horror that there were straps of some kind of material that looked like dried, tattered flesh pathetically bounding the creature's beast-like maw shut. Unfortunately for him, they were doing a pretty crappy job of it as the gigantic jaws snapped angrily at the air.

The strips of stained, leathery bonds had been wrapped with almost rib-cracking tightness around the creature's bony chest, causing it to take deep ragged breaths through its skeletal nose. What looked like a vertebrate remerged from Wrath's rib cadge of a chest, evolving into a malformed pelvis but the spine didn't stop there; What could only be described as a tail twitched angrily, constructed from nothing but flesh and segmented bone, thrashing against the ground like a whip.

It bent low, tucking its ragged wings in close to its chest slowly pacing back and forth on legs that ended in sharp stiletto-like points, the tail whipped as if it were trying to hold off a swarm of flies.

Jobe felt as though his stomach had turned to water as he slowly raised the loaded shotgun. He silently prayed that the thing that looked as though it belonged on the cover of Meatloaf's 'Bat out of Hell' was to stupid to recognise the fact that he was aiming at it with a weapon that could tare a hole through Wrath's chest like it was tissue paper.

It seemed to take forever for the gun to cover the distance to his eye to the tune of Wrath's gore stained blade-like feet 'clacking' to and fro. Jobe felt like he was about to have a cardiac arrest and someone had replaced his tongue with sand paper as he looked down the barrel of the gun. All he had to do was pull the trigger and this ugly motherfucker would be reduced to a smear on the pavement.

It must have waited for the very last second to jump away because when Jobe recovered from the vicious kick back from the gun, Wrath was no longer there. He didn't have to look around franticly for long as the creature was now leering down at him from the nearest car roof, growling wetly through a throat clogged with a mixture of phlegm and tar. Jobe had just enough time to notice a long, thick strand of the putrid smelling concoction hanging like thread from a gap between its numerous fangs before one of the wings lashed out. A small, sorry excuse of a hand grew out of it, adorned with oversized nails that bit into Jobe's chest as it grabbed his shirt. The man let out a shriek as they raked three, deep lines in his skin as the stumpy fingers closed eagerly around the shirt and lifted him off the ground as if he weighed no more than a rag-doll.

The surprisingly strong, pterodactyl-like arms hoisted a thrashing Jobe into the air, bringing him level with its silver dollar eyes while is rancid breath rolled over him in nauseating waves. The smell was so bad, Jobe would have vomited all-over the beast if it hadn't have clubbed him with the flat of its other paw, sending his head snapping back. Slowly, Jobe managed to roll his head back, only to come face to face with the tip of Wrath's cruelly curved tail that stung at his forehead with a quick jab. He whistled through his teeth as it began to burrow through the skin like an over-sized worm, gorging itself on the thin layer of flesh.

Jobe's eye caught Wrath's and in that instant, he saw the sheer, malicious pleasure it was deriving from this drawn-out torture and this time, he did vomit upon the beast.

But it didn't care; in fact, it threw its misshaped back and performed a hideous mockery of a laugh that bubbled in the contense of its raw throat.

Jobe didn't notice the ripping sound of fabric as he was too preoccupied by the barb that was now grating at the very bone of his skull until the material of his shirt finally gave and he fell back to earth.

Never had he been more grateful to fell the wet tarmac knock the wind out of him as he scuttled back from the car on his hands and ass. All the while, Wrath watched him like a kid observing how an ant wriggles helplessly between its thumb and forefinger as the child plays god. Its lipless grin was one of rapture.

Jobe shuffled round to the front of the car, dragging the shotgun with him. 

_WHAP_

The air ripped as Wrath unfolded its wings at break-neck speed and Jobe could do nothing but goggle at the spectacle before him_. _Three meters of raggedy, torn flesh stretched out from both of the sharp shoulder blades, giving it a six-meter wingspan. The frayed edges of lose, browned skin flapped loosely in the dead air as Jobe's rational mind realized that he'd just been presented with a huge target.

The handgun flew from his belt and Jobe didn't wait to aim before opening fire on the beast. The series of five small explosions were accompanied by a bray of surprise from Wrath as it teetered backwards. Small geysers of blood exploded out where hot slugs of lead sunk into it, powdering the air with a thin crimson rain.

When Wrath raised its head to look at him, Jobe realised that the gun had been clicking with dry importance for several seconds. Its eyes burned with furious anger as it let out a scream like razor blades being dragged over a chalkboard that set Jobe's teeth on edge.

The wings came forward as the wounded beast leapt down from the car at the man, aiming with spear-like feet and for once, he didn't think, he just was.

Throwing the handgun down, the shotgun came up and Jobe fired. The result was spectacular.

Wrath's chest simply exploded in a shower of blood as the oversize bat flew back, smashing into the car windscreen. Jobe slowly pushed himself back up to his feet, leaning on the heavy gun.

Any uncertainty that Wrath was just waiting to tare his head from his body was silenced when he saw he saw the state of the beast.

Its head was drooped on one shoulder, caked in a mask of its own clogged blood. The silver eyes stared lifelessly at a wing sheered by countless crystals of glass that it's landing had created. It had gone halfway through the plate of glass and now lay on a bed of the windows remains, dyed pink from the fluid that flowed from the hole where its stomach had once been.

_'Our friend isn't going to be getting up anytime soon'_ Jobe told himself in an attempt to sooth his frayed nerves.

That didn't stop him from jumping out of his skin when a voice asked,

"Zat thing dead?"

++++++++++++++++

A/N: For a better idea of 'Wrath', there's a link to a picture in my profile in case people though that was a self-portrait. Well, for their information, I'm really not that ugly, although I have been known to crack the occasional mirror just by looking at it….  


	16. A Question of Faith

Where do I get these these bizarre character names from? By the way, by the time you read this there should be some more art work uploaded on my profile so go check it out. For those wondering, that is a 'drowned' featuring on the art of Jobe page. 

For those who have been following 'Ave Maria', the next chapter should be up very soon.

Chapter 15: A Question of Faith

The only thing that saved the head that poked out from between the row of abandoned cars from being blown off its shoulders was the fact that Jobe had emptied the last cartridge into Wrath's chest.

"Whoa!!" The figure fell out from its hiding place, scrambling to his feet as Jobe lowered the shotgun gun, trying not think how close the man before him had come to going up the pearly gates.

"No need to do something you'll regret." The man held his hands, complete with long, brittle fingers that seemed to bend off at odd angles in a desperate sign of peace.

"Oh man," Jobe let out a lengthy sigh as he massaged the skin of the bridge of his nose and the man cocked his head somewhat, as if trying to get a better view.

"Hey, are you okay?" There was something European about his accent and going by looks, Jobe guessed that at school, the man's physic had earned him names such as 'bean pole' or 'the amazing rake kid'. The guy looked like a skeleton dressed in a thin shirt that stuck to his slender frame under the weight of melted snowflakes. His jeans seemed to be defying gravity to stay up around his nonexistent hips. Even his face looked skeletal, with over-pronounced brows, a sharp chin and eyes that seemed too large staring out from rings of purple coloured skin. The guy didn't look as though he'd slept in the last ten years.

"Yeh, just a bit jumpy I guess…"

"I can't blame you," He let out a laugh that seemed to get caught in his nose as he scratched at his closely shaved head, coated in a thin fuzz of black stubble. "I saw you take down zat thing. I would have done something to help but…" He trailed off with a shrug and Jobe didn't blame the man. From what he tell, the guy wasn't armed. At best, the German (Jobe had finally managed to place the accent, it had been driving him mad) could have thrown himself at Wrath and provided the beast with a tasty, if not to meaty entrée before it finished off Jobe.

"Well, I survived." Jobe could have kicked himself for saying something so unbelievable stupid but the man just threw back his head and let out another of those nasal laughs. That was when the little voice that had been silent for a blissfully long time decided to let it be know that it had prevailed through out the ordeal.

'There's something not quite right about this guy. When you first saw one of those…monsters, you practically shat yourself while Hans here just laughs his head off.'

Jobe silenced the voice. He was just paranoid after the one person who seemed friendly enough had…well, tried to kill him.

Jobe realized that he'd been staring at the man for long enough to make him shift uncomfortably. In an attempt to pass himself off as not a complete psycho, He blurted:

"So, what's your name?"

"You can call me Casper," Casper replied offering his horribly distorted hand, grinning like a naked skull. "And you?"

"Jobe." He responded, taking the hand in an awkward handshake. As his own closed around Casper's, he felt the brittle bones creek and grind under a thin membrane of cold skin. Jobe found himself relieved when their hands broke company.

A beacon of hope suddenly ignited Jobe's mind.

"Hey, have you seen a guy come this way? With blond hair, he may have been injured; we were in a car crash and_" Jobe found the words crumple like dead leaves, lost to the wind when Casper closed his eyes. It was as if a wave of ecstasy had run over his narrow frame and just reached its climax.

"Ah," he exhaled, "I vas wondering vhy you travelled to God's house." At these words, Jobe's heart sunk like a stone. It was then he noticed the minute, silver crucifix that dangled from Casper's neck and he began to wonder if (with some regret) whether his subconscious had been right to be wary of him. It wasn't like he had a positive view on religious zealots in this town.

"God's house?" Jobe echoed soullessly.

"Yah, it's just at the end of the street. I think you are seeking answers my friend, even if you don't know it yourself."

Casper's words floated past him as if they were nothing but an empty breeze but a thought raised its head in Jobe's mind:

The Dark Place 

Jobe was broken from his meditation by Casper's hand clapping on his shoulder.

"I too vas once lost, heading down on the road to hell but zen, something wonderful happened. I heard the voice of God and she gave my empty existence purpose, offering me salvation."

Jobe listened, trying not to think about having to go to this town's church. He'd had his fill of its twisted religion; he just wanted to get out of here.

(With Phil of course)

"What did god tell you to do?" He asked, feeling as though he'd awoken with the hangover to end all hangovers. All of this seemed so unreal, as if he wasn't here but just some entity watching these events from a distance, unable to stop them as they spiralled out of control.  

For a moment, a cloud seemed to pass over Casper's sunny exterior and he sighed.

"Like you, I have lost someone to zis town. She vas a lost soul like myself, if you will, and we travelled here at god's command but…" Casper rolled his hand as he searched his vocabulary. "We vere separated in the fog. I vould help you in your search but it is of the up most importance I find her. Soon." He stopped and beamed at Jobe with his ghoulish grin, all of the melancholy air that had filled his being simply floated away.   

"You vill find the answers you are looking for zhere, ha, everyone dose."

Jobe returned a cheap imatation of his smile and nodded. Why was it so hard to admit that this guy was okay, even if he did worship some demented god that was the catalyst for all the insanity around him? Casper seemed to be treating the whole affair as if it was nothing out of the ordinary.

"Thanks. I hope you find her." Was all an extremely confused Jobe could manage.

"You to, mien friend." Casper replied, casting him a carefree wave as he began to walk off into the fog, only managing to take a few steps.

"Wait, there's some pretty strange stuff out there," Jobe started, holding out the handgun. "You should take this." But Casper merely shook his head at the offer.

"I am armed with faith in god, and is that not the greatest weapon any man can posses?" He said, sounding as though he'd just quoted something out of the bible.

A dumbfounded Jobe watched as the man disappeared into the fog, taking his cheerful radiance with him and with every 'click' of his shoes, the momentary warmth faded just a little bit more.

Jobe shivered.

'How can anyone be so positive with all this crazy stuff around them?"

"Maybe love is all we need, huh?" He let a mirthless laugh as he turned to Wrath's still warm corpse. All he was greeted with was the dark, empty hole where the windshield had been.

*   *   *

Jobe sat down on the curb, panting like a dog in a heat wave. After discovering the absence of Wrath, he'd run down the street like there was no tomorrow. At one point he thought he'd seen something in the swirling veil of fog but he'd been going far to fast to take it in. Perhaps, not knowing was for best.

Virgil, it turned out had grossly underestimated the length of the street on her map. Jobe thought it was going to stretch on to forever as countless, ramshackle buildings flashed past him, looking like nothing more than watercolours through the fog.

Well, he'd reached the end of the road with out hearing the beat of the 'sin of anger's' wings or the chittering of the town's warped inhabitancies. He wondered if Casper was having a similar stroke of fortune.

'Oh well, if he bumps into anything, he can just charm it to death.' The image of the optimistic Casper trying to spread a little good will into the hart of Greed caused the man to brake out in a grin.

Jobe let the smile drop from his face as he looked up at his latest obstacle. The church was nothing out of the ordinary; A tiny, two story building that seemed to have been squished between the surrounding houses, complete with a peeling paint job covering swollen beams of wood that were fat with rot and damp. Jobe was finding it hard to believe that this was going to be the site of god's resurrection, let alone the point from which 'paradise' would spread out across the earth. 

The windows probably did a better of keeping out the pale, spectral light of this town that the walls themselves. The glass in them seemed to have decayed, turning an off yellow. Dim light shone from within the building, illuminating the panes of glass like the eyes of some enormous beast that watched him with an unblinking gaze.

Jobe scolded himself for being afraid but there was something about the church that turned his blood to ice. 

It sat there, at the end of the street, waiting for him, never imposing itself. It knew that eventually, Jobe would have to get up and come to it: that was inevitable. After all, wasn't it he who had said he wasn't going to turn around after getting so close. For all Jobe knew, Phil could be waiting inside.

'Well, we can sit all day here and turn into a nice little ice sculpture because you were scared of a church. Not too much fun, huh? Or we can go in there and hopefully conclude this little nightmare. After all, you'll" find the answers your looking for zhere",'

Slowly, Jobe got to his feet and began walking (far too slowly) towards the ominous little building. Too easily could he imagine dark tendrils pulling him towards the church, their knobbly finger's locking together, blocking anyway out back to the light.

Somehow, he managed to make it to the large, arched door, apprehensively resting a hand on the once copper doorknob. Trills of green vines inched over it where the metal had oxidised, slowly corrupting the handle. Jobe didn't want to let his hand linger there to long, it was far to easy to imagine veins of rust cropping up on his hand, contracted from the infection of decay the whole town seemed to be suffering from.

Jobe closed his eyes and turned the handle and it responded with a soft click.

"At least I've still got my health,"

As if on que, he sneezed.


	17. Sin's of the Heritic: The second interlu...

Yes, I am alive but things have been a bit hetic here so I had to put the writing on hold. That and I re-wrote this chapter more times than I can count.

_-How can you expect to look into the abyss if you cannot look into yourself?_

Sin's of the Heretic: The second interlude

_Part 1:_ _voices of the disembodied_

From the summit of the telephone pole, the solitary raven could observe the entire street with black marble eyes that reflected the rapidly fading light as dusk fell on the town.

Its head snapped up from the banks of fog that whirled about it as the sound of hurried footfall fell upon the raven's ears. Cocking its head, the bird listened with fleeting interest to the uncoordinated sound as it drew nearer.

Its glassy eyes followed the girl that burst from the dark mist as she ran madly. Anyone watching would have thought there must be some nightmarish creature chasing her but the raven saw no one but the girl as she hurtled past bellow, disappearing back into the fog. 

Its eyes lingered on the spot were she'd melted back into the thick air before the raven threw back its sleek, black head and let a solitary caw escape from its ragged beak.

*   *   *

Virgil could hear her blood pumping in her ears as she propelled herself down yet another decrepit street but she didn't care, as long as she got away from that…place.

She'd been behind Jobe when the voices started,

_(How could you do this to me?)_

goading Virgil with

_(you worthless piece of SHIT!)_

words only she'd been able to hear. She'd tried to

_(I loved you and this is how you repay me?! Well, you got what you deserved.)_

ignore them and warn Jobe not to go there but there was no stopping him, no matter how hard she tried to deter him Virgil would have explained but

_(HA HA HAAHAHA!!!!)_

every nerve in her body seemed to spontaneously combust, searing her with white-hot pain. For a moment back there, she'd actually thought she could smell her own flesh cooking as old wounds ruptured, tearing her tattered skin apart.

So, she'd run.

Like some scarred vermin she'd turned tail and abandoned Jobe to the darkness. But it hadn't abandoned her.

Even though she'd got halfway across town on legs that screamed at her to stop, she could still feel the sick presence of that false church coming after her as she ran blindly, shadowing every step she took.

Without warning, the pain exploded in her chest and Virgil slipped, finally losing her footing. She slammed into the ground, to raptured by the agony that shook every inch of her to noticing the ache that swelled up in her shoulder as it smacked the pavement.

She screamed again as her chest threatened to tare itself apart. Virgil was helpless to resist the voice of the town as it whispered soundless commands in her ear, willing her to succumb to it. A fresh wave of relentless agony washed over the girl and Virgil gave up. She'd gone far beyond the point of caring anymore.

 As the world around her began to be tainted by the darkness that had finally hunted her down, Virgil closed her eyes and let the buzzing hum that burnt her ears lead her to unconcisness. With one final hitched breath, she made peace with the darkness and let it consume her. 

*   *   *

The raven had long since taken off from its perch. The town lay sprawled out underneath it as it went in search of the carrion that littered its streets, so absorbed by its quest it didn't notice the sound of another air-born creature stalking it through the clouds of fog.

Soundlessly, the bird's stalker swooped down on the raven, impaling it on mercilessly sharp claws. The tiny bird screamed, letting out a wet, drowned squawk as Wrath regarded its catch before letting it plummet to earth like a stone. With mild interest, it watched as the bird fell, its wings limply spread in some vain attempt to take flight, but this sight only held Wrath's attention for a short time.

It had, after all, much larger fish to fry. Already, the sweet aroma of human flesh filled its nostrils.

Not too far away, a man named Jobe was approaching a car that was emitting a strange hymn of static.

*   *   *

Virgil opened her eyes but quickly clinched them shut again. The thin, sliver of light that infiltrated her lids set of an explosion in all the regions of her brain and set her eyes ablaze. Blindly, the girl sat up, her sodden cloths clinging to the damp tar-mack, quickly wished she hadn't as her head thudded.

Sitting there, Virgil waited for her senses to start working again.

_'So this must be what a hang-over is like,'_ She mused as she let her toung run around her mouth; it tasted as though some small, fuzzy and already decomposing animal had crawled in there while she was unconscious, looking for a place to die.

Virgil tried her eyes again and slowly the world shifted back into focus. A chill ran down her back when she saw how dark the sky had become, realising that Silent Hill's invisible sun had almost set. It wasn't that Virgil was afraid of the night, but the town's larger and more twisted inhabitancies tended to slink out from the shadows when light had been chased from the streets. To be honest, the girl was surprised she hadn't woken up to the sound of something mauling her arm.

With a groan, Virgil pushed herself to her feet, leaning on the sheathed kantana for support.

Trying to remember what had happened before she'd passed out was proving to be nigh on impossible. Everything was coming back in small, jumbled flashes, as if there was a broken T.V in Virgil's head playing back the events in whatever order it felt like. And then it hit the girl.

"Oh my god" She whispered in a very small voice as shock clenched at Virgil's heart. She'd attacked him…

"No!"

_Yes_

She shook her head as if to clear the memory from it but to no avail. It was stuck there like a deep splinter, playing over and over again like a jammed record.

Virgil saw that moment when Jobe had reached out in some vain attempt to help and that act of kindness had nearly resulted in him becoming right handed. All to clearly, she could remember the look of naked fear, which was barely able to mask the hatred that rippled beneath it.

"He hates you, now he'll see you for what _really _you are."

It was only when Virgil heard the voice that she realised she'd been trying to perform a lobotomy on herself, digging her jagged, pathetic excuse for nails into her forehead.

"You are nothing more than another _monster_, living in the shadows. Tell me, why did you attack him?"

Virgil locked her hands into fists, still staring with a hideous, burning shameful guilt at the ground.

"I-I don't know"

"Oh come on," The voice raised to a harsh, scratchy tone that made Virgil flinch. "You know why!"

"It-it wasn't him." She stammered in a wavering voice. "For a moment, I could have sworn there was some-someone else…" The girl closed her eyes, practically wiling herself to become deaf as she tried to lock out the voice.

"Really? Who did you think it was?" The voice crooned maliciously as Virgil quivered, rooted to the spot by some invisible presence that chilled her to the bones.

_'I don't want to remember, I don't want_'_

" Please don't make me do this," She whimpered. The very air around her crack with violent impatiens. 

 "WHO!?!" It bellowed like thunder, fraying the last of Virgil's already shattered nerves.

"BE QUIET!" She roared, spinning round to face her tormentor, blood pumping through her temples.

But there was no one there.

However, when Virgil saw what lay behind her a fresh wave of panic grabbed her and she froze, helpless to tear her gaze away from what lay before her:

If Virgil had taken another step forward, she could have been standing on the lowest step leading up to the church of Silent Hill. With a yelp, the girl threw herself back, landing gracelessly in a heap. Without thinking, Virgil drew the kantana, pointing it as the building as if it were about to attack her while shuffling backwards rabidly.

"No, no, no, no"

The air thickened, growing musty and rancid, as the church seemed to swell, pressing out against the confines of the surrounding houses. The building groaned like ancient bones, its long shadow chasing Virgil as it blocked out the last few shades of light. It was coming at the girl like some ravenous monster, intent on consuming her_

Virgil's back crashed into something soft. The girl shot a glance over her shoulder and found that she staring up into the eyes of the worst kind of monster.

"Welcome home," It said.

_Part 2: Nemesis_

Virgil rocketed to her feet, so fast that her head throbbed angrily in protest. The girl winced at the pain but never let her eyes leave the figure before her as she stumbled back.

"Leave me alone."

A momentary look of hurt flitted Claudia's face as Virgil spat the words, still backing away like a cornered animal.

"For a moment, I thought you'd seen the error of your ways and accepted what you are." Claudia slowly shook her head as limp white hair clung to her shoulders, refusing to let them go as if there existence depended on holding on to them. "But I can see that you are here for another purpose."

Virgil halted in her tracks as her foot hit the bottom step of the church's entrance and it dawn on her that she was between a rock and an extremely hard, painful place. There were precious few options still left open to her. Virgil's grip on the kantana's hilt tightened as she regarded the woman before her with both fear and malice.

"Virgil, isn't that's what your calling yourself now" Claudia cocked her head to one side as she asked the question, probing away with eyes that seemed void of emotion. She could feel them, reading every thought as if she were some open book Claudia could leaf through at her pleasure and Virgil suddenly found that she was having trouble keeping the kantana from lopping the woman's head off, despite how hard her hands were shaking.

"What an appropriate name Jobe gave you." A faint ghost of a smile crossed her lips as she uttered the words, knowing she had found a weakness in Virgil's apparently stony exterior, and from the look on the girl's face, she'd exploited it quite nicely. 

Any previous fear Virgil had disintegrated as the rational side of her brain was consumed by the bottomless hatred that was born from the subtle threat.

"You leave him out of this!" She snapped back.

Virgil's intimidation grew when she saw that her words had zero effect on unnerving Claudia.

"How can I? Even if he refuses to acknowledge it, he has an important role in the events to come."

Something cold started spreading through Virgil, and the inferno like anger was put out as quickly as it had come on.

"What?"

Claudia let out a short laugh, as if she didn't quite believe that Virgil, who looked like a five year-old who had just taken a crash course in quantum physics, was having trouble grasping such a simple (well, to Claudia at least) concept.

"You honestly thought he came to this town on his own accord?"

The look on Virgil's face was a good enough answer.

"I_I…" She tried but the words didn't seem to want to come together and the baron sentence had collapsed before it had even begun. Virgil's antagonist gave the girl such a look of pity that she broke eye contact and shamefully stared at the ground.

"Ever since his judgment, forces beyond Jobe's control have been at work, drawing him to this place so he can discover his true nature. Even you, a person so against our cause, have played your part in bringing him here."

Claudia raised her head, peering into the low heavens as if to acknowledge some nameless deity that was watching this performance.

"Why not give up this charade you are living and embrace the gift we have given you?"

Virgil gawked in disbelief, to stunned by Claudia's statement to reply. The woman would have had the same effect if she'd said the earth was at the centre of the universe and gravity caused objects to float.

"Gift?" She echoed flatly before her face creased with anger. "You call this a gift?" Virgil waved on of her twisted hands in front of the woman's face as she ranted. "You turned me into a god-damn freak!"

The look of hurt reappeared on Claudia's face but this time it lingered as she drew closer to the girl reaching out to her in what could have been an act of reassurance.

"Please try to understand_"

Virgil slapped the hand away, cutting the woman off mid-sentence.

"Don't _you_ touch me!" The words come out in a low menacing hiss, full of darkness that surprised them both. "I am not your friend and I am not your Alessa."

Virgil almost felt sorry for her antagonist when she saw the effect her words had had on her. Almost.

Something seemed to break in her, instantly the air of collectiveness evaporated from Claudia and Virgil suddenly noticed how weary she looked. Virgil began to wonder if her fear had been misplaced. What, if anything, could this tiered, old witch do to her?

"You are so bitter, Virgil and I know how you suffered_" Virgil shot her a dirty look, silently questioning how much she knew about suffering, crossing her arms in an act of quiet defiance but let Claudia continue.

"And that is why we offered you a place in god's eternal paradise." Claudia closed her eyes as she resumed her preaching, not noticing the dark scowl the girl before her regarded her with. "Just like all, your deeds have been judged. I don't think you understand the privilege you have received, for only a bear few can join god's ranks and help usher the people of this sinful earth towards redemption."

For a moment there was silence and Claudia wondered if Virgil had finally seen the light: That was until choked snort shattered the still air.

"You've got to be joking," The girl tired to stifle a laugh as she signalled to their impotent surroundings. "If this is your so called paradise, I'd rather go to hell!"

Claudia menancollany looked away as Virgil's mocking words died away.

"You truly wish to see hell?" the woman's head snapped back faster than it should have been able to. The icy blue eyes locked on to Virgil's, their coldness had been fully restored. Something dark burned within them and the girl quickly found herself remembering why she had been o so afraid of this woman. She began to step back but the damage had been done. Virgil had mocked the Promised Land one time to many.

"Then so be it!"

Claudia's iris's rolled to the back of her head and her whole body seemed to go taunt and stiff. The air surrounding the pair buzzed as if it were super-charged with invisible electricity that tingled Virgil's every nerve.

"NO!" Virgil cried, and this time it was her turn to reach out to Claudia with desperate, outstretched, pleading fingers. 

"One day Virgil, you shall take your rightful place at god's side,"

The very air that filled Virgil's lungs tore itself out of her in a raspy gasp, leaving the girl gasping dryly as a wind picked up, blasting past her. Even the light was unable to hold its footing against the cold vent of wind as it was carried away on the gale's breeze. Darkness hungrily enveloped the street, obscuring the dismal surroundings in a dark, foreboding vacuum. Virgil's wide, frightened eyes locked pleadingly with Claudia's but to no avail as she clasped at her throat, trying to force air into it but none would come.

Panic took hold of the girl as reality fell apart around her and she grabbed the kantana. The primal, self-centred level of Virgil's brain kicked into overdrive as her body began to loss touch with the world. Claudia was a threat to her survival and the catalyst of all her pain. Therefore, Claudia had to go.

Virgil raised the blade over her head with shaky arms that seemed barely able to support the oriental sword. It hovered there, indecisively for a moment before coming crashing down on the woman's head. In the split second it would have taken for the kantana to reach its lethal destination, the ground beneath Virgil's feet shifted, accompanied by the air's sudden loss of static buzz.

The sword hit the ground with an empty 'clank', bouncing off the mesh of rustic, pleated iron that had replaced the tar-mack. The thin metal lines criss-crossed over an impenetrable dark chasm that stretched far beyond Virgil's field of vision, echoing the scorched black sky. She didn't need to look twice to know where she was. 

Virgil's head snapped up to the spot where Claudia had stood only moments before but she too had vanished, along with the rest of normality. Virgil's eyes skipped over her new surroundings, confirming her worst fears. Everything around her was a twisted shadow of its former self: The houses that lined the street looked as though they'd been abandoned a thousand years ago to rot and fester. Some were even engulfed by creepers of twisted metal that rose up from the ground, ensnaring the trapped houses like ivy.

It was when she saw the transformation the church had undergone that Virgil let out a dry scream and bolted in to the darkness, trying n vain to forget what lay behind her. The small, almost insignificant building had warped into the obstinate monolith that still woke Virgil up at night in a bed of her own sweat. Its bricks and mortar had twisted into the stuff of nightmares, so she ran off into the unfathomable darkness, not daring to look back and forgetting all about Jobe.

Somewhere in the shadows, a raven cawed.

+++++++

What, you thought I'd forgot about Claudia?

I wasn't going to do this chapter origionaly but I thought it might be worth writing as Virgil's going to be out of the loop for a while (muttering to herself in some dark corner no doubt) and I wanted to do something with the pair.

Don't worry, we'll see what befell Jobe next chapter.


	18. Meeting Father Parker

From this point on, things may go a little slowly for a while due to the fact as I have to compleat my own body weight in course work and have exams looming on the horizon. Again. (Ah, the joys of being fifteen!)

Well, lets no ponder on that and as a treat, we have a new charater to introduce! But I figure you worked that out from looking at the title. As always, thanks for the reviews!  

Chapter 16: Meeting Father Parker

_"Perhaps, things would have gone so differently if fate hadn't worked out the way it did. What if Jobe's confrontation with Wrath had spun out a few minuets longer or the conversation with Casper had lasted for a couple more sentences? Maybe then, Virgil would have awoken before Jobe entered this church and prevented him from coming in, perhaps even avoiding that ugly fiasco with Claudia, necessary as it was._

_And what then? Who knows, I certainly won't. Fate ran it's course and so must this tail, and I don't have the time to linger on the countless and possible outcomes, as fascinating as it may be…"_

*   *   *

Tentivly, Jobe peered round the thick, heavy wooden door and took in the church's interior in a sweeping gaze.

He had to look twice, just to make sure his eyes weren't lying to him and painting a false picture to for Jobe's brain. Anticipating the very worst image of hell, nothing could have prepared Jobe for this. Everything inside seemed so…so…

_Normal_

It took Jobe's eyes a moment to adjust to the soft, warm and almost welcoming light that radiated from overhead lamps as he marvelled at the spectacle before him. A deep, luscious, red jungle of carpet flowed between twin rows of wooden benches and Jobe found he had to use every ounce of will power to stop himself collapsing on the nearest one. Throwing caution to the wind, Jobe stepped in side and closed the door behind him.

The rush of rich, warm air that engulfed him was enough to make his head swoon and Jobe suddenly realised just how cold he'd been. Ever inch of him felt as though it had been frozen, filling Jobe with a sickly coldness like the prelude to a bad case of flu. Having prevailed through sewer and snow, the church's mild heat was enough to make him swoon and he found himself suddenly shivering, and not just from the cold.

"Phil?" The slothful molecules of air hardly bothered vibrated at Jobe's feeble attempt at a whisper as he took another miniscule step, still clinging onto the doorknob as if it was a lifeline. Frustration began gestating within him as Jobe silently scolded himself for being so afraid. There was nothing in the church that should raise suspicion, everything from the whitewash walls to the stain glass windows possessed no threat whatsoever, even the smell of varnished wood and old books were comforting. On the country, they seemed to beckon him inside with a welcoming smile.

So why was he treading water at the entrance? Something was niggling at Jobe's mind like a hot nail, flooding him with suspicious doubt. The church's smile felt false, covering much darker intentions.

Looking at the hand that still clutched the decorative brass door handle, Jobe saw that the knuckles had turned bone white.

Reluctantly, he let go with a sigh.

"Phil?" The man tried again, slightly bolder this time as he prowled between the stiff wooden benches while trying to look in every direction at once. He felt like a guilty thief, creeping through some hapless victim's house as he softly approached the alter that stood at a lonely vigil at front of the church.

A musty book lat open on its stand and without meaning to, Jobe began to read the loopy script that tattooed the pages.

_'…And so,_ _the worthy's sins shall be absolved by Her undying love and they shall be forgiven, ushered into her eternal Paradise that will be the world reborn, in her faultless image…'_

"Come to join God's flock?" Jobe's head snapped round so fast that his bones groaned with a loud, audible creek. "Or are you looking for something other than spiritual guidance?" The mellow voice from the shadows spoke again, in a soft, southern accent and for the first time, Jobe saw the man leaning against the stone pillar, obscured by shadows. 

Jobe narrowed his eyes in suspicion, _'Great, just what I need! Another fanatic!' _And wondered if there was anyone in this town who wasn't tainted by its religion.

The man stepped into the light, revealing the soft and mature features of a fifty-something year old. Straw blond hair fell just short of his muddy green eyes in lazy, unkempt locks and grey had begun to taint it.

A foxish smile formed on his lips that took refuge under a Hitler-esque moustache as he pushed gold-rimed spectacles up the crook of his sharp nose, obscuring his sharp eyes as they flashed at Jobe. The black shirt filled out over his somewhat barrel-like physique, suggesting that the man's salad day's had been and gone but not forgotten as belt that seemed one notch too tight bounded his middle.

Jobe felt lead trickle into his stomach when he saw the black and white collar that encircled his somewhat flabby neck.

He refreshed his smile, showing of an array of white teeth that would erne him a place on a Colgate advert.

"Now, now. You look as though you've seen a ghost," He purred in a mellow voice. "And I (his accent twisted the word, coming out as 'ah') can assure you that I am no apparition."

Jobe tried to manipulate his face into an expression that didn't say 'I want to get out of here, NOW' which wasn't proving to be an easy feat.

"I'm sorry, I was just looking for someone. I thought they were here but_" Jobe trailed off when he realised the vicar was staring with a morbid attentiveness at both the shotgun and bloodied pole.

"Oh!" Jobe let out a short, uncomfortable laugh. "Well…there_" 

The stout man raised his hand.

"Do not trouble yourself, you don't need to explain. I know all to well what is happening to this town." A grave look crumpled his features but Jobe exhaled with relief. He had no idea how he would have explained the need for carrying enough weapons to start world war three and he found himself thinking that, perhaps, he could trust this man. There was something so charismatic about him.

"So what, is this all the coming of some 'Paradise'?" Jobe asked the question that had burning a hole inside him. Maybe for once, he might just get a straight answer. 

The vicar stifled a short chuckle and grinned wirily.

"Ah, I see you have met sister Wolf."

Jobe furrowed his brows.

"Who, you mean Claudia?"

The man nodded, the spectacles slipping down the sharp curve of his nose.

"I can see now the cause of your apprehension. Claudia is in possession of a somewhat…disturbing persona, but don't worry yourself. Sister Wolf's bark is far worse than her bite." The man smirked contently at his comment. "She is full of delusions."

Jobe found another question raise its head.

"But aren't you two part of the same…" Jobe made a vague gesture towards the collar that contained the vicar's neck as he tried to think of any word other than 'cult'. "Religious group, Father…"

"Please," the man raised his hands, in a sign of forgiveness "If we were being formal, then you could call me Father Parker, but as this situation is far from requiring formalities, you can call me Richard. And to answer your question, just because we are of the same faith doesn't mean we share the same beliefs." Towards the end of the sentence, the preacher's voice began to rise in intensity to the point where the last word was nothing but an angry hiss.

Jobe leaped back, into the alter as Father Parker began to pace back and forth like a caged tiger, "I mean, dose this look like an 'eternal Paradise' to you?" He continued, spitting passionately. His eyes snapped back onto Jobe, his glasses flashing dangerously as Richard swivelled his head.

"No" Came the somewhat meek reply.

"Amen to that!" Richard grinned furiously. Jobe found himself unable to stop his face creasing into a mirroring smile. The vibe of excitement Parker was emitting was contagious and Jobe found himself infected by his giddying intensity.

As quickly as the frenzy had come on, it vanished and the Father reverted back to his mellow self, perpously fixing his glasses back to their rightful position.

"So why is she letting all this happen if it is so against your beliefs?"

"As I said, Sister Wolf is considered somewhat of a radicalist" As he talked, Jobe sat down on the steps leading to the alter, hanging onto every word that Parker weaved and forgot any suspicion he had for the man.

"She believes that the world must first be reborn in the Almighty's image, cleansing it of all sin's before God's arrival."

Jobe looked pensively up at the man.

"And everything that's going on now, it's just a taste of what's to come?"

Parker nodded gravely in response.

"Unless she can be stopped, yes." There was a pause and the only thing that filled the air were tiny partials of dust that floated dreamily. "You must get out of here before that happens."

The stern words awoke something that had fallen to the back of Jobe's brain.

"Damn it" He quietly scolded himself for being so forgetful. "Has anyone else come here, except for me?" 

Richard's head suddenly perked.

"Why, as a matter of fact, there was. A young fellow like yourself was here no more than an hour ago."

Jobe leapt to his feet as a small flutter of hope rose in his chest.

"Was he okay?" He babbled. This was the first bit of good news he'd heard since, well, since he arrived

"A little worse for wear, but he took off before I had a chance to speak to him." Jobe's hope went out like a light, extinguished by an oppressive despair. 

_'If Phil had left an hour ago, he could be anywhere by now…'_

The disappointment that filled Jobe must have been evident on his face, for at that point Father Parker hurriedly continued.

"In his haste, your friend left his coat here, if that is any consolation."

Jobe followed the direction of Richard's shrug to a row of the firm wooden benches. It took his brain a moment to click and decipher the dark object that lay strewn across the elongated seat. As if in a trace, he walked towards_

"Phil's jacket…" He mumbled numbly, picking the leather coat up from its resting place. No doubt about it, Jobe couldn't mistake the coat that Phil had had since he was fifteen, which he still insisted made him look like James Dean. 

Something jangled softly as Jobe scoped it up. Parker peered curiously over the man's shoulder as he delved into the pocket, pulling out a small metallic object that rested in his palm.

"What is it?"

"A key," Jobe read the small, scuffed tag attached to it. "Blue Creek apartment."

Jobe grinned, tossing the keys into the air before stuffing them into his own pocket.

"Well, my boy, can you give me a hallelujah?! That sounds like a good lead if I ever saw one!" The Father clapped jovially on Jobe's back with a hard, square hand. 

"Hallelujah," Jobe echoed, still grinning ecstatically. For the first time, he was close to finding what he was searching so fruitlessly for. The end was near, and he could feel it as he strolled towards the door.

As Jobe crossed the church's threshold, he caught sight of a wooden statue of Jesus that hung suspended over the doorway and felt that hope burn so brightly that he could illuminate any darkness.

The door clicked to, and for a moment, Parker stared after Jobe. 

The silence's short reign was broken by a sudden uncontrollable burst of laughter.

He'd played his part wonderfully, filling Jobe's head with nonsense and acting as a 'guiding light' to his preordained destination. The game had been set, all there was to do now was to wait for the pieces to play it out…

Glancing up, Richard saw the crucified figure and laughed even harder.

"God truly is coming, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it," He cawed in a mocking tone. "Can you give me one last hallelujah?" 

Firing off a mock salute, he turned and strolled leisurely up the aisle, still roaring uncontrollably.

The statue of Christ merely watched him sadly with melancholy glazes eyes, a painted tear frozen on one cheek.

Another slowly welled up in his eye.


	19. The Butterfly Effect

Don't worry EPO, Virgil's part in this story will be revealed but I'm curious about what you were going to say about Parker. And thanks to wonderful failure, I'm glad your enjoying it.

I though I'd try something new with the opening of this chapter but I'm not sure if it works…

Chapter 17: The butterfly effect

As he stepped out into the cool night air, we must remember that Jobe was not the only soul to be affected by the dark reaches of Silent Hill. Hundreds have fallen victim to its nightmarish lull, stretching back to the first setterlers who built the foundations of this accursed town. These unfortunate dammed have either driven themselves to it through there own guilt or manipulated by whatever hellish powers that be rule this quaint corner of America.

We should take into account that Jobe will not be the last forced to see the true face of Silent Hill and many shall follow him. As Jobe shivered, wrapping his arms around himself in some vain attempt to keep the bitter atmosphere from stealing the last of the church's heat, there was another who had been touched by the darkness and brought dangerously near to the brink of corruption. At this point, we shall leave Jobe and his glorious inner light of hope and go to her, floating away from Silent Hill as if we were nothing more than leaves caught in a turbulent breeze.

Fifteen hundred miles away, a small, run-down service station stood out like a sore thumb against its dreary backdrop of monotonous grey farmland. The harsh, neon lights that blazed unwelcomingly from the windows were the only sign of human activity to be seen in the backwater landscape.

The girl sat by the window drew her knees up to her chest in an attempt to make the uncomfortable plastic chair she occupied slightly more habitable as she glared moodily at the bleak view, oblivious to the other patrons who sipped cheep coffee or leafed through dog-eared magazines with mild interest.

On a first glace, she looked like any other seventeen-year old. Dark roots were beginning to surface through the short dyed blond hair that fell over her eyes, hiding them behind a peroxide-yellow curtain. She looked ill and fatigued, as if sleep had eluded her for nights on end but if anyone had taken a second glance at the girl, they may have said she looked scarred…

But of course, no one did. Nor did they notice how dishevelled her cloths looked, the occasional smear on her white sleeveless jacket or the layers of grime that stained her boots an ugly crimson tone.

"Heather?"

The husky voice awoke Heather from whatever morbid daydream she'd been floating in and turned almost sullenly to its owner, who hastily took a seat opposite her and removed the limp fedora from his head. Rain started to beat against the window and quickly, the only thing that could be perceived through it was a dirty blur of drab colour.

"What the matter" It was hard not to notice the defeated air that clung to her partner like a bad smell. "Douglas, the car, its ok, right?" A feverish desperation seeped into her voice.

"Don't worry, the car's going to be fine…It might just take a while" The large, bear-like man avoided Heather's questioning brown eyes and instead told the story to his knees.

"What do you mean 'take a while'?"

Douglas sat back in his seat, letting out a great sigh as he absently scratched at his receding hairline.

"The whole engine overheated. There's nothing we can do until it cools down."

He cautiously stole a glance at the girl and was met by one of her patented icy glares.

"How long?" She asked Douglas, simmering like a volcano and he braced himself for the imminent eruption.

"Any thing from a hour to five" In reality, it could easily take ten for the engine to work again without protest. Last thing he wanted was to get on some abandoned strip of road and the car to finally give up. With the way his luck had been going that day, he wouldn't be shocked if it did.

Douglas grimaced but Heather didn't explode into a fit. On the contrary, she looked as dead as ever.

_'Can't blame her,' _Douglas lamented, _'She's been through more in the last day than anyone should in their entire life.'_

By the time he looked up, Heather had gone back to numbly staring out the window, whatching the raindrops wash down the translucent surface and he couldn't help but remember that he was the one who'd dragged her into this fine old mess. Maybe now was the time to ask the question that had been on the tip of his tongue ever since they'd set out on this damned odyssey.

"Heather?" His mouth seemed to dry up before the word even left it.

"Yeah?" She murmured, her head resting on the cool, glass surface. Condensation clouded it as she spoke.

"Maybe…maybe we shouldn't go to Silent Hill."

"What?" The word was so curt, Douglas barely heard it. Heather's head rose from the glass and she gave the man opposite her a look of sheer disbelief.

"It just doesn't seem that good an idea, I mean do you even know what you're going to do when you get there? And you saw how crazy things got back at the shopping mall, just imagine what its going to"

Douglas never got to finish whatever it was he was going to say for at that moment, Heather truly did explode.

"Oh yeah? Well what the fuck am I _supposed_ to do? I can't exactly go home, can I!"  Slamming her hand down on the chair with enough force to break it, Heather leapt to her feet. "Every where I go, this shit just follows me and destroys everything I have!"

Her voice had risen to the point where the other patrons glanced in the direction of the ranting girl, immediately losing interest in their newspapers and plastic flavoured, lukewarm coffee.

"Heather, please!" Douglas looked about franticly, trying not to notice just how many people where watching this unpleasant drama unfold.

"Ha! You have no goddamn right to tell me what to do; you're the one who got me mixed up in all this! Do you think I wanted anything to do with some fucked up Satanist's vision of Paradise?"

She drew in a hitched breath but before Douglas could protest, she was off again.

"It's your goddamn fault he's dead, and how can you question what I'm going to do when I get there? I'm gonna kill that goddamn bitch if it's the last thing I do!"

During the course of this passionate speech, the tears that had been building up in the corner of Heather's eyes had begun to flow freely, streaking her face.

"Heather, for Christ's sake calm down!" Douglas hissed, getting to his feet as an extremely aggravated clerk strode towards them. He _really_ didn't want a scene.

"Oh that's right, lets bring _God_ into this!" Heather turned to her audience and bellowed. "Hey, everyone! Lets have a show of hands of everyone who wants to go to hell!" She paused, sobbing hysterically. "No-one, not a soul? Guess I'll have to go to Silent Hill and blow Claudia's brains out, cause that's the only way to to" What ever she was going to enlighten her horrified audience with was lost as she broke down completely.

Douglas wheeled round as the fuming clerk tapped his shoulder impatiently.

"Will you please get her out of here!" The fat, small man hissed in a tone that was full of self-righteousness as he jerked a thumb at Heather.

The girl didn't protest as Douglas wrapped an arm around her, leading her gently towards the door under the scrutinizing gaze of the other customers. The passion that fuled the out burst had run dry.

"Feeling better?" He asked as they stepped out into the night, squinting as the pair was barraged by rain.

"Yeah…" Came the subdued response from under his coat. The two sat down heavily on the curb and were soaked to the bone within seconds. For the little good it would do, Douglas returned the fedora to its resting place atop his head and sighed.

This had been, without a doubt, the weirdest day in his entire life.

For a brief moment, he looked at Heather, his raincoat wrapped around her like a great cloak. Her once choppy hair was now plastered flat to her face by the relentless rainfall. Grinning to himself, Douglas compulsively lifted the limp hat from his head and dropped it onto hers.

Heather looked at him with a mild shock and Douglas couldn't help but laugh at them.

"Your really weird, you know."

Heather's comment just made him laugh all the more. The girl arched her eyebrows but found herself unable to stop a giggle escape her lips.

Pretty soon, the pair were sat there, roaring with mirth.

As wonderful as it would be to stay with these two and share their brief moment of happiness, Silent Hill beckons our return and we have our own protagonist to watch.

Jobe jogged down the church's stairway, his feet mushed softly in the slush that had congealed on the steps from the previous half-hearted snowfall. Oblivious to the world around him, the man pulled Virgil's dog-eared map from its bag while trudging briskly up the street.

And stopped dead in his track.

"Oh no…"

Blue Creek Apartments, his final destination was on the other side of that horribly large lake that divided the town in two.

"Frustrating, isn't it?"

Jobe's eyes tore from the map and whipped round to the owner of the voice. He had a horrible sense of dread he'd already made their acquaintance.

"Being so close to achieving your aims but the final key part being just out your reach."

"Claudia…"

He glowered at the woman who seemed to have materialised out of nowhere behind him, coming as subtly as the unperceivable night that engulfed the town. She nodded in morbid acknowledgement as her lips portrayed a watery smile.

"I see our mutual friend has expressed her views on me to you, Jobe."

Jobe stuffed the map back into a pocket and turned to face the woman.

"Yeah? Well she's not the only one who thinks you're some deluded deviant. Your fellow cultist, or Satanists or whatever the hell it is you believe you are, they think your nothing more than an out of control extremist." Jobe made a wild gesture at the church that had already sunk into the inky night as he launched into his testy verbal assault. He laughed.

"Hell, only some back-water bible basher like you could possible create this and call it Paradise!"

A look of mild incomprehension contorted Claudia's features.

"You think that I was capable of doing all this?"

Jobe opened his mouth but his feisty words had evaporated and he quickly shut it again.

"This is God's work, preparing this land for her glorious return to this world." Something flickered in her eyes and Jobe saw the look of manic, undoting faith that flashed across the pale orbs.

He was afraid.

"I am nothing in the grand scheme of things. All I am trying to do is bring the people of this earth the salvation they desperately deserve, and you are going to help me do so."

It took Jobe's brain a few seconds to latch onto her words, which had been uttered so calmly, Claudia could have been commenting on something as trivial as the weather.

"What? I don't want anything to do with this madness! Salvation? I'd call this the very opposite, how can you stand there and say this is paradise when it's nothing more than a glorified hell!" He drew himself up and glowered at her in preparation of the reaction.

It sure as hell wasn't the one he'd anticipated.

Claudia lifted her head and looked at Jobe, no, through would be better. He eyes seemed to lance into the layers of his skin and examine something much deeper. He shivered.

"I don't think you truly understand the gratuitous suffering that ravages this world. When god arrives, the veil of ignorance and predigests that clouds the people's minds will finally be lifted and they will finally be able to coexist. Can't you see? Finally, something will be done." The emotionless, robotic quality in Claudia's voice fell away. "I refuse to wait any longer for the coming of god's kingdom and watch as we slowly destroy one another .I do not understand why must you oppose me so?"

Jobe flinched but stood his ground. "Because the day the world need's a garden of Eden that look like this is the day when the world has gone as mad as you."

Claudia threw back her head and let out something that may have been a laugh but was so devoid of humour it made Jobe wince.

"You truly believe this world is such a perfect place? How can you say that when only a hundred years ago, you would have been persecuted merely for the colour of your skin?"

She shook her head.

"No Jobe, this world is a terrible place. Perhaps you need your eyes to be opened to the sins that seem to fuel its very existence…"

Claudia gave Jobe one last sorrowful look and then everything went black and Jobe's world blazed into a spectrum of pain.

"Oh God!" He started but it was quickly lost in a scream as every inch of skin felt it had been torn from his body. The malevolent force began worming its way under his flesh, searing every nerve it touched. Jobe fell to the ground as a chorus of screams echoing his own exploded in his ears with cries of pain and torment.

And that wasn't the worst of it.

Inside his head, any positive thought disintegrated, leaving nothing but hatred, sorrow and self-loathing, each emotion flaring one after another, leaving his senses reeling. Jobe grabbed his head, as if his hands could lock out the torrent of convolutions that wracked his being. 

 Above it all, he could still here Claudia's voice.

"Do you see now? This is only a tiny proportion of the pain people suffer due to the ignorance and wrath of others. Gluttony, Sloth, Envy, they've all played their part in corrupting the world."

Jobe raised his head that felt it would crack like an egg under the sheer volume around it and through eyes blurred with tears he saw a break in the darkness. He lurched towards it, trying to stave off the unconsciousness that threatened to engulf him on legs that felt broken in five places. With each step he took, the agony swelled, reaching an all-new crescendo that he didn't believe to be possible.

With a shaking hand, he reached for the window of light…

And fell straight through it.  

A/N God, I'm so mean to Jobe.

For those of you following my other fanfic, Ave Maria, the next chapter is nearly compleat.


	20. Who's afraid of the big bad wolf? part 1

Chapter 18: Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf? (Part 1)

With his eyes clamped tightly shut, Jobe prayed so furiously that the blood smashed at his temples. The first thing he'd noticed since he came too was that it was blissfully quiet, gone was the hellish ballad of scream that made his flesh crawl. In comparison, the sharp caw of woodland birds seemed idyllic.

As he lay there on the ground, revelling as coarse blades of icy rough grass jagged into his back with every breath he drew, Jobe prayed that it had all been some nightmarish fantasy and in truth, he was lying on the road-side having been propelled through the front screen of his car.

That would make so much more sense than the last few hours of insanity Jobe had endured. After all, a traumatized mind could have easily fabricated such a warped dream of monsters with a cast of lunatics, most of who belonged in the extras list of 'The Wicker Man'. After all, the idea of God being born in such an ambiguous town as Silent Hill was ridiculous, let alone the thought of him aiding in 'the coming of Paradise'. Jobe let out a laugh that helped imprint the idea even deeper into his mind and open his eyes.

A canvas of grey sky, dotted white by fat snowflakes, greeted them.

Jobe sat bolt upright, his sudden movement shocking the silent landscape like some cardiac arrest. There was a rush of shrew cries from the birds as they took flight; beating their wings so fast you would have though a clap of thunder had scared them from their posts. For a moment, Jobe traced the dark cloud's random movement as it ascended and broke apart before letting them wonder over his new surroundings.

This certainly wasn't the roadside.

Sprawling out before him was a thick forest of pine trees that seemed to reflect the dull grey of the winter's sky, as their spindly tops brushed dryly against one another in the ghost of a breeze. The long branches were covered in a thin dusting of the white powder that seemed to have bleached everything he saw. So dense was the wood that within a few meters of the perimeter, any of the pale rays of light were soon swallowed by its ominous shadows. Now void of bird song, the whole thing felt dead.

Jobe stood up, trying feverishly to hold onto the idea that the whole thing had been a dream. With every detail his eye took in, the comforting delusion slipped further and further away.

He span round, the frozen grass crunching under foot and he saw that he wasn't alone in the tiny clearing. Behind him lay a small, ramshackle house, its black tiled roof standing out boldly against the bone-white backdrop. The whole building looked as though it could collapse into a cloud of dust if any more snow landed on it, not that it would be a great architectural loss.

"What the hell have I got myself into now?" Jobe muttered to none in particular as he rubbed the bridge of his nose in an attempt to relieve some of the stress that was welling up inside him. He felt as though he would burst in a minuet. Wasn't he due a break by now?

Fate, the grand master of things, deemed not.

"What are you doing here?" An indignant voice asked.

Jobe took a deep breath before wheeling round and coming face to face with his tormentor.

"What am I doing here?!" Jobe didn't even try to hide the furry that throbbed like a heartbeat in his temples that threatened to explode when he met Claudia's accusing gaze. "What am _I_ doing here?! You're the one who started playing mind games!" He shook his head in bewilderment, trying to shake off the rage that clouded his rational thinking. "Just what the hell was that anyway?"

Claudia merely folded her arms as Jobe ranted, flaying his own wildly.

"Think of it as an eye opener. You"

"Stop right there, I don't think I can take listening to you launch into another of your o so enlightening preaching about," Jobe through back his head, roaring in a deep mock voice of a minister, "_The wonders of God's everlasting Paradise_!" He snapped his wild, wide-eyed gaze back onto the pallid woman, panting heavily. He could barely stop himself from laughing in her face as he saw his words taking affect; a small bud of anger was slowly beginning to gestate behind her somewhat frosty exterior.

For a moment, Jobe pondered if his mind had finally crumpled under the weight of the insanity around him.

Claudia opened her mouth again but the man just turned his back to her.

"You know what? I don't have to put up with any of this. You want to worship devils? Well that's just _dandy_ but I swear, if you try to pull me into this Biblical crap one more time," Jobe let out another short burst of mirthful laughter, shaking his head. "Well, I can't be held responsible for my actions. I'm going to find my friend and get the hell outta here." Glancing over his shoulder, revelling at the look of malignant wrath fermenting on the woman's face and he began to walk away. Hell, he wasn't content with pushing her buttons; he was going to fucking _tap-dance_ on them.

"Good luck with the apocalypse and all!" Jobe yelled, casting a cheery wave over his shoulder. The man broke into a run and quickly joined the fleeting shadows that webbed between the trees, praying that he could leave all this insanity behind him.

Claudia let him go…it wasn't like he was going to get very far.

Jobe had been running for all of two minuets when the adrenaline high began to wear off.

_'What the hell were you thinking running off into a wood?'_

(Not much)

_'Do you know how big it could be?'_

(Nope)

'Do you even know where you are?' 

(Not by a long shot)

Jobe slowed to a trot. The last thing he needed now was to get lost in a forest. A thin dusting of snow began to build up on the man's shoulders as he came to a halt and weighed up his options.

"Aw hell" he muttered to himself as he reluctantly turned round to go back to the house. At least he'd still be able to follow his

Jobe's train of though came to a crashing halt when he saw where he was.

He might as well have taken two steps from his starting point.

"No!" He cried, his brain trying to make any sense of the phenomena as Claudia looked up at him with mild interest. She opened her mouth but Jobe spun away and charged back into the wood before Claudia had a chance to vocalise her thoughts.

Jobe ran, kicking up great clouds of fallen snow as he pushed his legs as fast as humanly possible. He _had _to put as much distance between that clearing as possible while his mind still reeled with confusion.

'That…that just wasn't possible, I should have been able to see that house, let alone be standing next to it.'

Jobe let out a rasping gasp, ignoring that his lungs felt as though they were slowly being stuffed with cotton wool and charged deeper into the woods, the trees becoming brown blurs as he speed past them on increasingly weakening legs. Jobe's shoulder clipped one of the spindly pine trees and that was enough to send him flying through the air and he went down like a rock, his momentum dragging him through the snow.

He just lay there for a moment, trying to catch his breath as he panted like a dog. When the feeling of asphyxiation finally passed he glanced half-heartedly over his shoulder. The house was just as close as ever.

There was the soft crunch of snow under foot and a long shadow fell over Jobe as he let out strenuous moan. He just wanted to close his eyes and never have to open them again.

"I did not mean to bring you here, Jobe," Claudia continued more to herself than the figure that lay in on the frosty carpet and seemed all but oblivious to her words. "But perhaps it is for the best you witness these past events."

He sat up, the snow clinging to his back, encrusting it in a cracked white shell. Something in her sentence snagged him.

"Past?" He repeated, scowling as he made sure his mind wasn't playing tricks on him and he'd heard her correctly. "Just where the hell did you bring me?" Jobe began to rise slowly, his heart hammering within his chest like a trapped bird.

Claudia, however didn't appear to have heard him as she stood transfixed by the black house.

"Leonard always abhorred the public eye…" She muttered so softly Jobe barely caught it as she stared in an almost catatonic trace.

He would have asked who this 'Leonard' was but some obscure shadow flitted by the corner of his eye. Jobe glanced over his shoulder and…  
"Shit!" The man leapt as if he'd grabbed a live wire and goggled at the sight before him in shocked disbelief.

Jobe hadn't taken much notice of the large rock that jutted up from the snowy blanket and to be honest, he still hadn't given it a second thought, rather it was the figure that had materialized out of nowhere and was now sat upon it that held his dumbfound attention captive.

The girl had to be no older than eleven but she looked horribly matured for her age, as if she'd been twisted prematurely by the hand of time. She seemed oblivious of the man who goggled at her with a look of shear confusion as she gazed at the house with a look of hopeless defeat. Her glassy eyes reflected every other detail of the barren landscape except for the delapid building, transfixed as though it hummed a siren hymn that only she could hear. Even though he'd never met the child, it was far too easy for him to recognise her as a younger version of the woman beside him.

"But…but…how?" Jobe couldn't string a sentence together as he began to back away from the melancholy girl, still wondrously oblivious to him. A pale, ghostly complexion had been painted upon her drawn, starved face, its whiteness spoiled only by an ugly purple bruise that flourished under her eye. Absentmindedly, she began to chew the inside of her cheek as she drew the threadbare raincoat she donned round her tighter in an effort to stay warm. Perhaps staying warm was part of her act of procrastination as she tired to prolong her time outside the house.  

'It's her…but how is that even possible?' He glanced back to Claudia who was observing her young doppelganger with a harrowing look of sorrow. She moved her eyes onto Jobe and in a sad tone uttered: 

"I never used to understand what he was trying to show me until now. That pitiful creature over there had no concept of what he was trying to tell me, and interpreted it as some perverse punishment. I guess in a way it was…"

The girl let out a bitter sigh as she slowly pushed herself up from the rock and began to trudge towards the house at a snail's pace, her hands thrust deep into her pockets.

Claudia began to follow but only got a few steps before pausing and looking back at Jobe.

"Come, perhaps then you will understand my motives. After all," She continued towards the house, not bothering to check weather or not Jobe was following. "It was through his teachings that I became aware of the horrors and faults of this world."

Jobe watched as the pair were swallowed up by the house and the stillness that held sway over the clearing gradually regained control.

He stood there, treading water for a moment as he attempted to work out a marginally logical solution for all this. Was it a dream, some sort of living memory? His overloaded brain could barely cope with thinking straight, let alone tackling the idea that he'd got himself lost in some dark corner of Claudia's head.

With a start, Jobe realised hat he'd been staring mindlessly at one of the windows that revealed nothing save for how dark it was inside the house. The longer he stared the deeper that window seem to become, slowly expanding into a hole that gave way to a merciless chasm, so deep you could drown in its inky depths.

Jobe took a deep breath of the crisp air and reluctantly walked towards the house.

This was origanlly going to be just one chapter but it would have been way to long. I have exams next week so I don't think the next chapter will be up for a while.


	21. Who's afraid of the big bad wolf? part 2

Apologies for taking so long with this long, long chapter. As many of you have guessed, Leonard makes his grand entrance and I can only hope I've done him justice. Thanks again for all the reviews.

Chapter 18: Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf? 

(Part 2- Life's little lessons)

There was a harsh screech as the girl pulled the chair away from the desk it resided under, its four spindly legs raking against the bare wooded floor.

Letting out a long sigh, she dumped her satchel on the desk as if the moth-eaten bag weighed two tonnes and collapse onto the chair. For a moment, she did nothing but stare at the ceiling, observing with a sad indifference how the patch of damp above her head had grown even larger, its rings of decay slowly tracing a large circle on the peeling paper.

_'Be grateful you even have a ceiling over your head' _a voice muttered from the depths of her mind_._

Mentally scolding herself for even doubting her father's generosity, Claudia reached over to the desk lamp and clicked it on.

Nothing happened.

And she was far too tired to do anything about it. Any way, there was still enough of the pale, ghostly light filtering through her window for her to see what she was doing.

She had to do something, anything to take her mind off

Some horrible, loud internal groan erupted from her stomach and the girl finally was forced to admit that she was hungry. No, not just hungry. Ravenou

"Don't think about it…" She whispered to her self, trying not to think about food or the last time she ate. When was it, yesterday, the day before? Just the memory chewing on some tasteless morsel was enough to make the girl salivate like one of Pavlov's hounds. Sadly, _her_ master hadn't deemed her worthy of feeding for a while. In her father's opinion, forcing her to starve like this was "Good for her character."

A shaky hand shot into the satchel, desperately clamping on to the first book it knocked into. Any thing to distract her from the relentless creature that hollered in her gut.

_Maths_.

With a mad desperation, she flicked through the books pages, searching for anything to provide a mild interlude from the constantly nagging hunger but to no avail. Her mind would only latch on to the words and numbers for a bare few seconds before it began to wonder or she was interrupted by another empty mew.

It was only when the metallic tang of blood tainted her tongue, she realised she'd been gnawing on it with a cannibalistic relentlessness.

_'Just wait a little longer, he's never let you go much longer than this…'_ A random thought surfaced in Claudia's memory, snapping her out of the self-induced daze.

Knocking her chair aside, the girl leapt at the small bed that was just about the only other object to occupy the barren room.

"What is she…uh…you doing?" Jobe asked the woman next to him as her younger counter part moved to the top of the bed as the pair observed her apparently random actions, nothing more than silent ghosts viewing a summoned memory. He'd accepted that at this point, all laws of physics and logic had taken a trip out the window.

"A simple act of self preservation…" Was the riddle he got in return.

Somewhat cautiously, the girl peered down the narrow space between the wall and the metal rails that made up the ancient bed's frame, trying to decipher the dust and shadows that congregated there. A diluted grin formed on her lips as she spied her trophy, a faded packet of crackers.

"CLAUDIA!"

Her hand hovered over her meagre prize and an expression that plainly said, "oh fuck" even if the girl dared not utter the word itself (for blasphemy was a sin) flashed across her face.

Jobe swivelled and look from the door to the woman in black. The bestial voice that erupted from down stairs sounded loud enough to be on the other side of the bedroom door.

The girl paused, silently calculating if eating just one of the crackers was worth the risk of educing her father's wrath.

It was.

Claudia made a grab for the packet as her father roared again. She turned her head to the door as she pulled her arm back up, opening her mouth to tell him she'd be down in a second…

But she froze, and the words were never formed. Her arm was stuck.

"**CLAUDIA!!**" came the call again, whatever patience the voice had had was waning dangerously thin.

"Oh hell…" She muttered to herself, forgetting the damning consciences of uttering such a word as she tried to yank her arm free from the gap.

Icy fingers of desperation began to creep around her neck as the hurried thudding of heavy shoes ascending the stairs rapidly filled her ears, cutting her breath short.

She tried again but to no avail, all the while, the pinpricks of anxiety jabbing away at her temples grew in ferocity.

If he found her committing this act of defiance…well, the repetitions would be far from pleasant.

There was a rip as Claudia's sleeve split, snagging on some lose nail jutting from the bed frame as she tore her arm free. She fell back on the bed and barely had time to sit upright before the door to her room was violently thrown open. There was a resonating crack, like the splintering of bone as it hit the wall behind it with enough force to leave a dent in the plaster but that was the last of her worries at that moment.

"Who?" Jobe didn't dare take his eyes off the lean man who stood in the doorway, breathing heavily.

"Leonard Wolf, my father…"

There was some resemblance between the two but it was plain to see that Claudia hadn't inherited her laid back mentality from the man who currently looked as though he was about to decapitate the first living thing he saw.

Mercilessly pale eyes locked onto the girl sitting on the bed. The look of simmering furry was wiped clean from his sharply cut face, replaced by a mask void of expression that echoed his older daughter's somewhat.

"I called for you," He uttered in a low tone; the sound was flat and oddly calm after the previous display. Dangerously calm.

Jobe felt the skin on the back of his neck rise into a heap of goose bumps and shuddered. He had a dull precognition of the dark territory this scene may be about to explore…

Claudia suddenly became aware of just how heavily she'd been breathing as a look of suspicion crept into Leonard's eyes. She cut off abruptly and quickly looked down at the bed she sat on.

"What have you been doing?" The man asked as he began to walk with a slow deliberateness towards his daughter, the floorboards groaning under his soft footfall.

"Nothing…" Came the meek answer as Leonard's long shadow fell over her and she felt her mouth go dry as the sound of her own heart drummed away inside her head. Her eyes raced about in their sockets as she desperately tried to come up with an excuse.

Looking at the younger version of his antagonist, Jobe suddenly found himself thinking of Virgil and her child-like uncertainty. The way the girl shrank back under the unscrupulously frosty stare of her father reminded him of the overly submissive and fearful deposition of the warped human oddity he'd met what like an eternity ago.

"I was just"

CRACK

Jobe didn't even see the board like hand move as it flew across the child's face with uncensored force; silencing whatever alibi she was going to offer. The sheer effort and suddenness off the stinging blow sent the girl sprawling on the floor while Leonard's face maintained its expressionless quality.

"Oh my god" Jobe blurted out of shear shock. He made a move towards the man.

"Don't bother yourself, there's nothing you can do." His Claudia's voice rung dryly in his ears and the listless words stopped him in his tracks. He turned at looked at her, a look of lost confusion on his face.

The woman he had come to hate so much over such a short space of time slumped slowly down the wall she lent against, folding into a dejected heap.

"We are here only to watch. Anyway, there was never anything anyone could ever do…" She frowned, her face wearing a look of defeat, watching the events at the other side of the tiny, cramped room unfold.

Leonard moved to the spot where the girl lay, blinking dumbly in surprise. He crouched down next to her, not even bothering to look at the stunned child.

"Why do you lie to me Claudia?" the silver-haired man drawled sternly as he squatted by his floored daughter, massaging his red knuckles.

The girl pushed her self up and looked at the man, the look of board indifference was still on his face. Leonard's eyes flashed from his hand to the girl.

"I was only…" She really didn't mean to look at the bed but guilt and the simple fear of her father kept on drawing her eyes back to it, where all the incriminating evidence lay in all its glory, just waiting to be uncovered.

_'Tick-tock when the tell tail heart'_

She could practically hear the cogs that whirled away within his skull click into place as a thin scowl materialised upon his face. He rose back to his full height and cast her one last quizzical look before turning to the bed and prowling towards it, like some oversized beast of the night.

Jobe turned to his tormentor but she seemed lost in a world of her own. It was only later that the irony of that sentence struck him.

He turned back in time to see Leonard raise, the box of crackers clenched triumphantly in his hand.

"You were only what?" He echoed, "Gorging yourself like the insolent beast you are?" His child dropped her head to the floor as his voice cracked, fermenting anger worming its way into his words.

"WHY!" He spat. Claudia flinched.

"I…was just so hungry." She croaked, her voice nothing more than a whisper.

WHAMP 

This time, Jobe saw the balled fist smack into the child's face, snapping her head back. The fist hovered in the air, as if debating weather or not to land another blow on the girl as she stood motionless, absorbing the abuse like a sponge.

"How dare you even think of disobeying me? Did I say you could eat?"

"no"

WHAMP 

"SILENCE!" The fist sailed back again and this time the crunch of soft cartilage was clearly audible.

"Haven't I explained the Sin's of man enough times to you for it to sink into what little brain you have? Or are you just so resistant to learning that you chose to disregard my words for your own entertainment?"

The girl dared not even breath, trying to ignore the stabbing pain that accompanied the stream of blood now running freely from her nose.

"ANSWER ME!!"

"I though…maybe…you had just forgotten"

"Are you questioning my intelligence?"

The girl's head shot up, her eye's wide with surprise. Realising she'd made a fatal error she steeped back from her simmering father who's lips were so tightly draw together, the very colour had faded from them.

"No II honestly d"

This time the hands locked around the collar of the girl's worn jumper. Leonard yanked the child viciously towards him, bringing his head down to her level until there where a bare few centimetres between the pair.

"Stop grovelling, you insolent bastard!  You're nothing more than a mortifying embarrassment." He hissed, his voice like gas escaping from a rusty pipe at high pressure.

He pushed her away, sending Claudia tripping back into the wall.

Leonard sighed, rubbing his temples as if to release some great stress building up within his skull. He looked up at his daughter; the mask of unhealthy calmness was back on his face.

"Tell me Claudia, what is the sin of gluttony?" He folded his arms as his daughter looked up at him timidly.

"Eating when you do not need to…"

Leonard clapped his hands together, a flat and impotent sound.

"My lord, it knows something!" The mirth dropped instantly from his voice. "But such a simplistic explanation…well, it's all that can be expected of a degenerate such as yourself." He shook his head sadly, not noticing the muscle in Claudia's jaw twitch or the momentary glint of malice that flared in her eyes. But then she remembered her place and quenched the flames of hatred that had briefly burnt her heart.

"No, gluttony is so much more than simply over feeding yourself. It is that sick feeling of satisfaction that some twisted, atheistic souls achieve from gorging themselves to the point where even the though of movement is beyond them. To put it simply, it is nothing more than a masochistic desire, much like the root off all the sin's that coax us from the path to Paradise."

The grey man sighed again, hoping for once his words would sink in, but the girl merely stood there with her head bowed, probably not able to comprehend the meaning of his carefully explained words. He sneered at the spineless cretin that he'd been burdened with for all these years, silently wondering how a god-fearing man like himself had wound up with such a pitiful excuse of a human being as his offspring. He turned away and began to slowly pace around the room like some caged tiger, running his fingers through his slick and greasy strands of hair.

"It amazes me how much you disappoint me Claudia…I always hoped you could have amounted to something more than this." He spoke more to himself than the girl who watched him walk back and forth, waiting patiently for him to finally lash out again.

He stopped dead, his glacial eyes freezing on some distant point.

"I think it's about time we had another lesson." And with that ambiguous comment, he strode from the room, the sound of his shoes beating against the scuffed floorboards quickly fading away.

The girl looked as though she was about to be sick as she stood there, all alone in the centre of the dank room.

Well, for once she wasn't truly alone.

"What in the name in all that is holy is going on?!" Jobe exclaimed, wheeling round to the woman behind him.

She was still sat against the wall, her rigged composure seeming to have all but collapsed.

"My ongoing education. This must all seem so barbaric to you, must it not?"

Jobe avoided her gaze, and a nauseated look to rival the girl's began to tweak the muscles of his face.

"Yes…" Came the shallow reply. He forced himself to drag his reluctant eyes back on to the waxen woman again. "Why how could he do this too you?"

"Why? For the simple reason that he could. My father was something of a pivotal figure in this town. People learnt not to raise their eyebrows if they saw that 'backwards' child of his brandished with a bruise or two. As for how…" She paused a moment, silently contemplating the question. "He believed it to be necessary."

"Necessary? Beating and hurling abuse at you as if you were some verbal punch bag was necessary? How the hell did, no, could you're father justify doing that? For a man of 'God', he seems to have some pretty warped ethics."

Claudia let out a short laugh before looking face on at Jobe for the first time this whole escapade had started.

"I could never, not in my wildest dreams live up to his expectations. He was oblivious to any personal triumph of my own, only ever able to see my infinitive faults, so he took it on as his own personal pilgrimage to iron out each of these errors in my character in some attempt to perhaps redeem himself for bringing such a hopeless creature into this world."

"Why didn't you just run away?" Jobe couldn't help but feel a sickening wave of sympathy for the woman each time he looked at her that threatened to drown him.

She turned her empty eyes on to him and Jobe felt himself shudder as he saw what lay with in those melancholy pools; the woman was dead inside.

"I knew nothing but this town, Jobe, it was the world to the children of Silent Hill who shared my upbringing. Even when I grew older and learnt of it, I still did not leave. I couldn't."

Jobe cocked his head, silently yet softly pressing the interrogation.

"What, don't you think I know how people like you regard me? In your eyes, I'm some bizarre anomaly you wouldn't even want to try and comprehend due to my faith. I _scare_ you. The modern world wouldn't accept me and that is why I have refrained from embracing it. To put it briefly, I had nowhere else to go."

There was a pause.

"Also, in some bizarre twisted way, I still loved him, as hard as that must be to believe."

Jobe continued to stare at her even as the sounds of Leonard's footfall returned, trying to sort out the emotions that raced through his head. How was he meant to sympathise after the prolonged hell she'd put him through, launching him from one insane nightmare to another? Thanks to her interference, everything he'd taken for granted had disappeared in a swirl of ashen fog and even if he came out of the whole mess alive with his sanity intact, there was no way he could ever see the world in the same pure light ever again.

Jobe left the thought hanging as Leonard made his re-entrance.

Gone was the air of weary irritation; in its place was a malicious grin that spanned from ear to ear. Jobe could practically bask in the self-righteousness that radiated from the man as he strode towards his daughter who seemed to shrink even further under his unforgiving observation. Her eyes flitted nervously from his face to the brown paper bag he carried in the crook of his arm.

With yet another sneer, Leonard threw the package at the girl and she caught the package clumsily.

"Open it" He crooned, his voice dripping with a hideously forced kindness.

The bemused girl pulled back the packaging. Her hands froze and she looked back up at her father, brows furrowed in a confused knot.

Jobe felt his stomach curdle when he saw the thick slice of raw meat lying in the girl's palms, unable to stop is mind echoing back to the dog's head that had come tumbling out of Virgil's fridge. He shut his eye's, trying to ignore the acidic flavour that had come crawling up his throat.

Leonard's smile grew even wider as he beamed painfully down at Claudia.

"Well, you said you were hungry." The warm tone in his voice instantly withered. "Eat."

She goggled at her father. He expected her to eat this? Claudia looked down at the chop lying across her hands, horribly aware of the capillary-thin rills of blood running between the creases of its vibrant crimson surface. A feeling similar to the one Jobe would experience eighteen years later in this exact spot began to creep over her.

"**EAT!**" He bellowed curtly, clipping the child across the ear. "Do you still dare to defy me even now?!"

At a snail's pace, Claudia lifted the slab of raw meat to her mouth, casting her father a final pleading look. He expressed no compassion.

She bit and did all she could not to be sick as she felt her stomach convulse at the metallic, coppery flavour that flooded her mouth. Even the rough, leathery texture was enough to make her spit it out.

A dry gag escaped from her clenched jaw's as she willed herself not to be sick right there and then;

That would do nothing but enforce the image her father regarded her with, as some weak subhuman entity, not even worth the air it wasted.

"Look at you" Leonard cawed, crossing his arms as he began to preach. "Nothing but some animal! Are you really so weak that you cannot stave of your petty hunger? Do you fold so easily to this sinful desire that you will eat raw flesh, like some savaging beast?" His face had begun to flush as his voice rose with each word, a manic glint flashed in his eyes. He was in full swing and there would be no stopping him now 'till the righteous message was out.

"You truly are of weak character. It is disgusting, nay, revolting to think something that revels in sinning as much as you can even dare to think they are worthy of crossing the threshold of Paradise…"

The sentence began to die and gradually silence began to reclaim the room as Leonard noticed how 'it' had stopped chewing.

"Swallow it" The quiet tone of his voice seemed a thousand times more terrifying than the uncontrollable rant. He glowered down at her, the cold, glassy eye's almost daring her not to do it.

She could she could do this…

No 

Another wave of nausea swept over her and Claudia made a more to spit it out.

"You even _think_ of doing that, and I swear, I _will_ make you eat that off the floor."

The girl caught herself, the muscles in her jaw jumping spasmodically.

"Stop procrastinating and just SWALLOW it!" His fist fell to his side, clenching so tightly that he felt his nails bite into his skin but he managed to hold back, despite how thin his patience was being drawn. It was just so tempting to lash out but he would contain himself for now, after all, he was above giving into _his_ primal urges.

Claudia shut her eyes and swallowed the revolting mass, trying to force the raw bulk down her throat without regurgitating it.

"So, this is how willing you are to surrender your humanity, is it?" The girl stood in silence, shifting uncomfortably under his scolding.

"Yes"

"And it is gluttony that has driven you to this, isn't it? Now do you see the errors of your ways?"

She nodded forlornly.

"Good, now finish it."

And this time there was no resistance as the girl began to consume the meat mechanically, any shards of dignity left inside her at the beginning of the 'lesson' had shattered, disintegrating into nothing but dust.

"He did teach me much about this world, I'll give him that…" Jobe barely heard the words as he stared numbly at the spectacle before him. Sure, his father had beaten one or two things into him during his youth but that was nothing compared this…this torture. How anyone could behave like that was beyond him.

"Now do you see?" His Claudia's words once again invaded his thoughts.

"See what?"

"Why you must help me." He could hear the underlying tone of desperation in her voice.

Jobe sighed, closing his eyes to try and block out the sound of Leonard's egotistical voice as he degraded his daughter further.

"No…" He exhaled. "I don't understand why you're showing me this, I don't even understand what it is you are trying to do." He eyed her over his shoulder. "Do you have any idea how crazy you sound, you want to what? Recreate the world?"

"Yes, for the good of humanity…" She trailed off, licking her lips as she tried to organize her thoughts. "I have suffered, as you can see." She gestured towards the ongoing scene. "And it may only be a tiny, insignificant fraction compared to what is going on in this world but I have learnt from it. And it is enough to know no one should have to go through anything like this, be it slavery, famine or abuse due to the greed of others."

"Shit happens, it's part of life and there's nothing you can do about it." Jobe felt so cold saying it but it was true. "I'll agree with you that the way the world works is screwed up but we can't just wish it to go away 'cause it won't. It's all part of human nature."

"Wish?" Claudia raised an eyebrow. "Oh, what I, we are going to do will go far wishing. When God is finally returned to us, she will recreate this world, removing the harmful desires from the hearts of men. Then…" She shut her eyes, the tension building up in her voice instantly dissolved. "…The people of this earth will truly be able to coexist, living as one in Her eternal Paradise."

Jobe looked at her, torn between hatred and empathy.

'She really does believe she's going to do this, bring about the day of Judgement or what ever it is.' 

"II can't help you do this."

Her eyes snapped open.

"It just doesn't feel right." He paused, contemplating the effects his words were going to have on the fanatical woman. "If this 'God' wanted us to save us, if she though we really needed it, then wouldn't she have done it by now?"

The words faded, absorbed by the room as Leonard stormed past the pair as if they were no more than enthral shadows. Claudia looked past her father, a look of insult on her face.

"You of all people should know what a dire state this world is in"

"What are you talking about!?" Jobe felt his temper snap. "Why must you always speak in riddles!?" His hand's clamped down on her shoulders as Jobe's frustration bubbled. "Why, can't you tell me why I have to help you? You talk of me being judged, being worthy. WHY?? What have I done?" The last word escaped through clenched teeth.

"You still don't know?"

"KNOW WHAT!"  The grip on her shoulders tightened but the woman didn't flinch.

"Then I'm afraid you still have much to learn…"

Jobe opened his mouth but blinked out of this existence like a candle before the slightest sound had a chance to escape.

Claudia stared momentarily at the empty space that the man once occupied before turning to her younger self. Doing this to him made her feel terrible but he would have to accept what he was before he would see. Perhaps it had been a mistake to let him go for so long with out knowing.

"Then again, ignorance is bliss…"

She crouched beside the child who had curled up on the floor in a foetal roll, staring at some distant spot in the distance.

"It's going to be fine" She muttered to the catatonic child. "You'll see…" With that, the world around Claudia collapsed, fading away to nothing and leaving the woman in the dark void of her mind.

_All alone... _

           

A/N: Thank god there isn't a 'prevention to cruelty towards fictional characters' agency.

Well for keeping you waiting for so long, there's more artwork up, including sketches of Parker and Claudia.

Squishy: What do you mean by original? Sorry to disappoint you but Father Parker won't be making an appearance for a while but Virgil should be making a return in a few chapters. Have fun with the inferno.

RandomNamelessSHPerson: Heh, thanks but I think she was right on some points. I never realised literature could encore people's wrath to such an extent.

Anyone looking for a good read should check out E.P.O'S recently finished fanfic before it sinks into the backlog of completed stories, as well as Mike N's and hauntedheadnc's refreshing piece.

On another note, I finished the 'Ave Maria' fic if anyone cared.

Thanks for reading.


	22. A humble citadel

I really wanted to do this whole section in one chapter but it would have been painfully long. Anyho, Claudia's moment in the spotlight in now over (for now) so I can turn all my attention back on Jobe….grins sadistically

Jobe: NOOOOO!

Chapter 19: A humble citadel

"You still don't know?" Claudia glanced sideways at the man, examining him questioningly from the corner of her eye. Jobe felt the final shard of patience within him snap. Ever since he'd fallen head first into this living, breathing and oh so horribly real nightmare, she'd been bating him with these obscure questions that lead into an endless cycle of yet more questions. He grinded his teeth, feeling as though every blood vessel in his body was about to explode, veins pressing against his forehead like tight chords. He cracked.

"KNOW WHAT!"  The grip he had on her shoulders tightened but the woman didn't flinch.

"Then I'm afraid you still have much to learn…"

Jobe inhaled sharply through flared nostrils but that was the closest he got to scream his desperate plea for her to make some coherent sense. In a fraction of a second, everything went to hell. Literally.

The hands grasping Claudia's shoulders so tightly that Jobe could feel her very bones through her scratchy black shirt simply slipped through them, as if the very molecules between his fingers were pulled apart. Before his brain even had time to react, the whole world was ripped from underneath Jobe's feet.

The floor simply disintegrated beneath him, dropping away to nothing save a dark pool of oblivion and there was nothing the man could do to stop himself plummeting down. Jobe opened his mouth to scream, his stomach in his throat as he fell like a rock. He gritted his teeth as his organs lurched with vertigo as the darkness swept past at a dizzying speed.

He was going to keep on falling and falling and falling and falling and….

And then it stopped.

Just like that. There was no bone shattering impact or endless pit just waiting with its maw wide, ready to consume him.

Jobe gasped, staggering backwards, but both feet were firmly on solid ground. He opened his eyes, looking down just to make sure it was really there. Grey, dull tarmac stared blankly back at Jobe and the man was unable to stop a wild smile from spreading across his face. Jobe had never before truly appreciated just how wonderful firm ground was.

 _Terra firmer,_ he could quite happily get down on his knees and kiss it.

However this still left the question of where he was and how the hell he was going to get to Blue Creek Apartments…

Jobe managed to tear his eyes away from the o so beautiful soil that he'd been avently worshiping and looked up to find himself standing before the steps of yet another of Silent Hill's decrepit, dingy hellhole of a building.

He had to do a double take when he saw its name.

Jobe gawked in dumb disbelief as he let his eyes run over the words _Blue Creek Apartment_ again and again. The more times he read the worn, chipped words scrawled across the plak above the door, the more real and tangible they became.

_'But how…how is that even possible?'_ When he'd left the church, he'd been on the other side of the lake, let alone anywhere near this place. He sure as hell hadn't sleep walked here. If anyone moving around this town could get from 'a' to 'b' in one piece while not in complete control of there senses, let alone unconcious it would be a miracle. Even if he had, how would he have bypassed the lake?

 Another thought began to take root in the dark corners of his mind, the touch of its ever-growing tendrils chilling him as they slowly took a stronger, choking hold.

Had Claudia deliberately dumped him here after they're far from warming trip down memory lane? Did she actually want him to find Phil?

Jobe let out a curt bark of laughter, forced but only to reassure himself. Why on earth would she want or care if he succeeded in finding his friend? All she seemed to care about was the coming of her beloved god and next to her holy crusade; his affairs must seem damn trivial.

He steeped up to the door of the apartment, leaving the though behind him as he ascended the weather-beaten steps. Gingerly, Jobe pressed a finger against the door, his digits registering how the wood had swollen from damp, as if stricken by some bubonic disease. He pushed and it swung open as effortlessly as a rope swing caught in a breeze.

Jobe watched as the wooden panel slung back silently, revealing nothing but an empty black rectangle. He almost wished the door had let out an ominous creek as he'd opened it. Somehow, the silence seemed so much worse. With a click of the torch, he stepped inside the mausoleum; the only thing he heard was the nagging voice that resided in he back of his mind, quietly asking if this really was such a good idea…

The second he drew the door too, the whole room died. Even the stale air seemed to size up, the heavy molecules falling instantly still as he sealed the entrance hall off from the outside hall.

Jobe let the small circle of light travel over the mildew stained walls, wrinkling his nostrils as he let them grow accustom to the thick stench of damp rot that hung lazily in the air. Slowly, he made his way towards the staircase that lead to the next floor, ignoring the small, lonely office that occupied the meagre hall.

_'I already have everything I need…'_ Jobe let his hand slip into his pocket; his fingers closing around the keys that lay within as he slowly began ascending the stairs.

_'I'd love to see what the estate agents have to say about this place.' _ 

Jobe passed silently down the narrow hallway, his eyes not truly able to register all the foul details in all their glory. Like a man thrust into open sunlight after spending years in the dark, the initial, scaring glare had begun to were off; he hardly noted how the bare carpet occasionally gave way, exposing the bare floor boards beneath. Nor did he notice the black, charred holes perforating the wall paper (bleached a sickly pale by years off darkness) like bullet holes. Occasionally, his eyes would flick from door to door, barley resting on the brass numbers as they blurred by but he was blind to all else.

"Shit"

He stopped, cussing his ignorance. This was the first floor; he needed to be on the second. Jobe lifted the key from his pocket and read the digits emblazed upon it, trying not to notice how the teeth of its filed head had dug into his skin. He'd been clutching it so tightly that its fangs had dug a line of holes into his sweaty palm.

_'217'_

Jobe exhaled, snapping up the key as he began to walk, shoving it back into the depths of his pocket. His tongue darted over his lips and he could feel the thin lining of perspiration mist his brow. He was _so_ close now to ending it all. Now, all that was left was to ascend the stairs to the next floor and put a key in a lock. Easy as pie, right?

Jobe sullenly doubted it as he reached for the knob of the stairwell's door. He was sceptical that the town wouldn't throw at least one last nasty little surprise for him before he escaped from these nine ever decreasing circles he'd got himself trapped in…

Jobe pulled the metal pole from his belt as the door clicked too behind him.

Now there was no other way but up…

Jobe had barely planted a foot on the first stair when something above him stirred into life. Correction, _roared _into life would be closer to the truth.

The man arched back, projecting the light onto the ceiling as tiny specks of dust fell away from the boards above him, pupils dilated in dark anticipation.

Gradually, the familiar, morbid stillness crept back over the stairwell but Jobe seemed to have frozen with it, staring transfixed at the ceiling.

_'You can't just stand here forever, move!'_

His feet stayed solidly rooted to the spot, his ears straining for the faintest noise to give some idea of what was lurking upstairs, waiting smugly in its dark, invisible habitat.

_'Come on, we're so close. What's a little noise to some of the shit you've wadded through so far on this crazy escapade?'  _

After what felt like a little short of an eternity, he finally managed to build up the courage to progress to the second step.

**'CHHHHRRRRRCK'**

Even through the sole of his shoe, Jobe could feel the vibrations travel through the worm-eaten boards as something thundered upstairs. It sounded as though some warped giant was padding directly above him…

The resonating footsteps paced over-head, the floorboards above him groaning furiously with each heavy step. Jobe tightened his on the pole, holding it like some great bat while his heart hammered away in his chest like some caged bird. He watched the dark plateau, not even daring to blink as he waited for the second floor's occupant to finally make its entrance. 

Jobe froze when the long, gratuitous head slowly slunk into the trembling circle of light that hovered on the small landing.

"Oh shit…" The words creaked over his lips and for a second, Jobe could have sworn that the tireless rhythmic beating of his heart actually stopped.

The beady eyes that seemed to small for the centaur's head blinked stupidly as the torchlight glistened of the liquid orb. Slowly, the bestial head turned to him and those undersized eyes locked onto him. Jobe felt himself shrivel back under the gormless gaze; his grip on the metal pole gave way.

The rest of the centaur's form slowly filled the pathetic arc of light and for a painful stretch of time and everything was hideously still.

A/N- My god, I spelt disease right for once!


	23. Vanity

Chapter 20: Vanity

The creature dove at him, leaping down the narrow flight of stairs and making a direct beeline for the man. Jobe lunged for the door, slamming it tightly behind him but even through the thin panel of wood, he could feel, let alone hear the thunderous crash as gratuitous mass of muscle and claws smashed into the floor. It's howling roar set his teeth on edge as it resonated throughout the building.

Without thinking, Jobe rammed the metal pole under the doorknob that looked all but ready to fall from the door in some attempt to barricade the nightmare out.

_'Oh yes, that really going to make a difference' _If one of these creatures could demolish a reinforced iron door, a rotten wooden one wasn't going to do Jack-shit except perhaps provide tooth-picks for the centaur to remove the remains of Jobe from between its fangs.

Already, the sounds of it moving could be heard…

Jobe feverishly scanned the narrow hallway, looking for anything that could prolong his survival. That was when his dancing eyes fell upon the long, rectangular box hammered to the wall only a few paces away from him. Through the musty glass panel, the siloet of a fire axe could be just be seen.

Deeming that his current situation over-ruled the _'do not break unless in an emergency situation'_, Jobe smashed the transparent panel with his elbow and wrench the axe free, ignoring the sharp pain as the shards of broken glass his hand.

He swivelled round and faced the door, perspiration stinging at his eyes as he waited for the centaur to tear down the door and probably tear him to ribbons… 

Jobe flinched as the sound of splintering wood reached his ears and the creature behind the door let out another thick roar.

Yet the door remained.

Suddenly it dawned on Jobe how quiet the hallway had become, as if some muffling blanket had fallen over it, smothering even the faintest noise. Nothing could be heard on the other side of the door and Jobe realised that in the pregnant silence, he'd even stopped breathing. Watching the door like an unexploded bomb he let a hand fall from the tightly griped axe and switched the phone in his pocket on.

The heavy silence reigned on, uninterrupted by the phone's mechanical ballad that should have been going haywire due to the centaur being so close. What the hell was going on?

Jobe took what could have been his final breath, blocking out the voice of reason as he threw the door open, only to find himself staring into an empty hallway. The centaur had simply vanished into air.

_'…But how?'_

Then Jobe saw, and his primary relief shrivelled up like an autumn leaf.

A jagged hole lay before him, starching across the space between the man and the stairs that ascended to the second floor. Jobe dropped to his knees, his legs crumpling underneath his body as his brain went numb. All he could do was stare at the empty, deep cavity before him that fell away to an unforgiving darkness.

So what had happened here? Well, it is no great mystery, that's for sure. The floor-boards had simply given away under the centaur's great mass, all it took was for the gross beast to raise up on leg and the pressure just became all too much for the already sickly floor.

The look of shear surprise that flashed across the less warped of the two head was disturbingly human as the sounds of the wooden boards singing their splintering swan song cracked through the stairwell. The centaur gave one final moan and plummeted into the darkness, taking out most of the stairs to the first-floor with it. It smashed into the entrance lobby's tiled floor in a rain of grimy debris and its own blood, it's eyes rolling wildly in its sockets as it tried to comprehend the rapid series of events and the pain…all it knew was pain.

He didn't want to scream, rave or shake his fists at the heavens at the town's twisted deity exclaiming how unfair it all was. He didn't feel wronged or even angry…only an apathetical sense of defeat. He felt crushed.

Without thinking, he rose and walked as if lead by an invisible other away from the hole that mocked him with a wide, black and ragged grin. Its silent, mocking laughter was almost deafening.

Aimlessly, he wandered like a ghost down the hallway, his head bent low.

_'So close…'_

There

_'So close…'_

Was

 _'So close…'_

Nothing

_'So close…'_

He

_'So close…'_

Could

Something flashed by Jobe's peripheral vision and his head snapped up in time to see the door at the end of the narrow hall snap shut.

That was all it took to shake free from the emotionless shackles…

"Phil?" His throat cracked dryly as he called, breaking into run. In a single moment, he was outside the door, banging on it with his bleeding fist.

There was no sign of life within.

Jobe didn't even think of the possibility that his exhausted brain could have finally fallen into the pit of insanity and brought the axe savagely down on the door, the brittle wood splintering under its bite.

Within seconds, he'd smashed his way into the room.

"PHIL!?"

He stepped over the remains of the door, frantically searching for _any_ sign of his friend. All he saw was himself staring back.

Jobe stopped, looking in silent awe at the enormous mirror that spanned across the opposite wall. He stepped closer, examining the mirror image of the room but found to his horror he could barely recognise the man staring back at him. Tired eyes gazed listlessly at him from sunken hollows and his skin seemed to have taken on a sickly ashy tint. His once spiked hair dropped lifelessly round his head, doing nothing to lift the impression that all the vitality had been sucked from him.

Had he finally caught the sickness that seemed to have touched everything else in Silent Hill with withered fingers? Was he going to end up like Virgil, who's exposure had left her as nothing more than a scarred shadow or perhaps surrender his sanity and will as Claudia seemed to…

He was so wound up in his thoughts that he didn't notice the reflection raise its arm as if on its own free will. It was only when its finger tapped against the film of glass that he snapped back.

And screamed.

Jobe backed away from the mirror, goggling in silent terror, as the image remained firmly where it was, its finger still pressed against the glass. It grinned as it began to speak in low, rusty, twisted tones.

"Do you still know who you are?"

Jobe's back hit the wall. He tried to turn away but his eye's were glued helplessly to the mirror, like a kid who wants to turn away from the T.V, knowing that they're about to witness something grisly but just can't.

"I don't think you do. WAKE UP AND TAKE A DAMN GOOD LOOK AT YOURSELF" The reflection stopped, its final word dying abruptly in its throat. It glanced over its shoulder and the look it shot Jobe when it turned back made every inch of his skin crawl.

"She's coming for you, perhaps she'll help you see…"

Despite his rising terror, Jobe managed to blurt out a single question.

"Who?"

"Vanity" It let the word roll of its tough, savouring the look of shear fear that cracked across Jobe's face.

The mirror's image began to slowly darken, the room corrupting with the coming darkness. The walls browned like spoiled fruit as the floor crumbled away into nothing but a fine grate stretching over perpetual darkness. His reflection simply faded, still grinning with a dark lunacy but Jobe had already made for the doorway.

Only to find himself staring at a wall, his escape rote plastered over.

He turned back to the room, tightening his grip on the axe, as he frantically looked for any means of escaped. He froze when he saw the mirror.

From the shadows that had engulfed it something came shuffling forth…

'Vanity' 

It lurched towards the plane of glass that stood between it and Jobe, becoming more visible with each dragged step.

A lone eye peered out from between a gap in the long curtain of hair that fell over its face. 'Her' arms hung loosely from slouched shoulders, swaying to the steady beat of her march. It seemed to be wearing some sort of dress but it was nigh on impossible to distinguish where that ended and its flesh began. Both were rotten patches of white and brown that flared like bruises. But that wasn't the worse of its myriad of rancid features.

Raking up from its shoulders were shards of sharp glass, stained a rusty brown with Vanity's own blood.

Jobe was so absorbed that he didn't notice it come up against the glass until is hammered two balled fists into the panel. They came down again, and this time, a thin, hairline crack splintered across the translucent surface.

'_Oh god, it's going to get in here!_'

This time, the spindly monstrosity lent its body back before slamming into the glass like a living pendulum and the whole panel shattered into a billion crystal shards.

Jobe gripped the axe even tighter.

The malformed thing stood upright, as if to admirer its destructive handiwork before stooping down and grabbing one of the long dagger-like fractions and Jobe noticed all to well the sharp fracture it ended in. Slowly, it began to march towards him, barely lifting its feet from the floor.

He hoisted the axe high above his head and lunged at Vanity, bringing the weapon down in a heavy arc.

It dodged, leering out of the way as Jobe tripped past his monstrous target. He let out a hitched grunt as it swiped at his side with the shard, slicing his chest and he tumbled to the floor.

It didn't hesitate to descended upon him like a furry, the sharp nails of its free hand digging into the first thing they touched, holding the writhing man down as it raised the glass knife in preparation to bring it down on his exposed neck.

Jobe's hand locked around the creature's bony wrist, stopping the shard's lethal journey towards his jugular vein.

Vanity howled as the two struggled on the floor as the knife inched closer to Jobe's skin. He caught a momentary flash of his wide eye reflection in the glass's flashing surface.

"NO!" Jobe's hand locked around the butt of the pistol that had been waiting patiently in his belt and whipped it out, pressing it into the Sin's side.

It lone visible eye went wide.

BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM 

Vanity rolled off him as Jobe leaped to his feet, trying to block out the infernal creature's high-pitched scream.

He looked down, void of pity as the thing writhed on the floor, clawing at the ground as it tried to rise.

"Stay down" He muttered raising the axe above him. Vanity's milky grey eye locked onto him.

"Monster…" It hissed vehemently in a disturbingly human voice. Jobe froze and the axe hovered in mid-air.

"Nothing more than a monster…" It choked again and he could feel it smile.

"Damn right."

And the axe came down.

Yes I know Vanity was a blatant rip off of  Sadako from the ring but I was having trouble coming up with a design foe a creature that is men to be the embodiement of self love.

Please don't shoot me…


	24. Through the looking glass

Sorry for the delay, I've been away…

Chapter 21: Through the looking glass

Jobe creaked upright, ignoring the twinge in his back and strode past the decapitated corpse of Vanity. Even though he didn't give it a final glance, her final words rang dully in his ears like a sombre bell toll.

'Nothing but a monster…' 

_'Ignore it'_ He hissed to himself as he drew near the mirror but the question of the obscure sentence's meaning remained, like an itch just out of the reach of clawing, groping fingers. It was maddening.

Jobe's shoes crunched the slithers of glass into the faded carpet and he came to a dead stop at the frontier of this reality, peering into the darkness before him. He suddenly found himself wishing he'd asked the optimistic Casper or Father Parker to come with him on his 'quest'. Hell, even having Virgil with him in the state she'd been in when she attacked and abandoned him would be better than facing the insanity that lay only a step away from him alone…He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and realised he was doing little more than procrastinating. Through the shattered looking glass was the only route opened to the man now.

"Well, you're damned if you do…"

With what felt like all the will power in every fibre of his being, Jobe crossed over.

"And you're damned if you don't."

He shivered as he felt this nightmare realm fall in on him like thick layers of musty dust, instantly leaving him with an unexplainable feeling of deep, incurable uncleanness.

Jobe looked once more over his shoulder at the somewhat saner side of the town and in some perverse way, his heart ached for it. There was nothing he wanted to do more than step back into the light but even he knew he'd gone too far to turn his back now…

The rusty copper grating wined as he quickly ran across the room, trying not to take in its Bosh-esq features.

There was however one spectacle that caught his eye and he paused, frowning as his brain tried to make sense of it. 

Besides the vast mirror, there had been an old, neglected armchair in the room rammed into a forgotten corner. In this hellish version of the room, the same chair rested in the exact same position, mirroring its doppelganger. Except for the fact this chair looked as though it had been brought from Beelzebub's own version of 'World of Leather'.

A mouldy canvas had been draped over it, its white hue fading to a wan, infected yellow and the leg's protruding from the hem stuck out at odd angles.

Something sat in the chair. In his jumpy state, Jobe did well not to blow a hole through it as soon as his eyes observed it. When the shadow didn't leap from its resting place and maul his face, Jobe let curiosity absolve his fear and he creped towards the chair.

It was nothing more than a baseball bat, at least, that was what Jobe though before his eyes took in the minor details of the wooded bludgeon.

It lay, its handle pointing to the ceiling but its head had been stained black, as if the very wood had rotted in the black, tar-like substance that lay in a heavy pool around it. Defying gravity, the congealed, viscous liquid ran up the bat in thin rills, fading to a threatening shade of crimson as it thinned out. From the zenith of the bat's handle, the liquid (which Jobe felt uncomfortable sure of its identity) dripped upwards, hitting the ceiling with a wet '_plunk'_. It ticked away like a metronome as Jobe watched the droplets splatter against it, dying the ceiling a filthy brown, with each drip, Jobe sensed a feeling of familiar terror rise within him, setting each hair on the back of his neck on edge. The bat, despite being an inanimate object felt darkly threatening, more so than some of the berserk creatures Jobe had run into.

He tore his gaze from it and ran from the room, trying to block out the hypnotic, tireless _'plunk'. _Any longer and he feared he may lose his already loosening grip on his sanity.  

The buzzing sound hit Jobe like a sledgehammer, drilling mercilessly into his skull the moment he stepped out into the hallway. The man gritted his teeth, striving to gather one consistent thought as the world screamed about him. Is sounded like Jobe was in the midst of some colossal broken machine, grinding against itself and all the while moaning beofully for someone to oil it. He staggered towards the door behind which the stairwell lay, moving on blind instinct as he tried to recall the plan of this world's reflection. He thudded into the door, his hands desperately fumbling for the doorknob. His head felt like it was going to explode at any given moment, the ear-splitting sound swelling inside it like some festering balloon, threatening to burst.

With a moan, his blind fingers found the brass knob and without a moments hesitation he tumbled through, kicking the door too as he fell.

The insane Siren ballad ceased almost immediately. Jobe lay on the floor, blinking as he revelled in his newfound silence. When his mind had time to collect itself, he found himself thanking the powers that be that in this mirror dimension, the hole left by the centaur was yet to be made.

_'Wouldn't that have been a laugh if you came tripping through that door only to fall to your death.'_

Man, this place was even screwing up his sense of humour. The minuet he found Phil, he was getting the hell out of here, Claudia and her 'prophesy' be damned.

Jobe rose, looking up the flight of stairs, the memory of the centaur's kamikaze dive still fresh in his memory.

He shuddered before beginning his ascent up the stairs but the second he touched the banister, he fell back from it with a scream.

It had pulsated against the skin of his hand like some obtuse artery and was unsettlingly warm. Tentivley, he pressed the palm of his hand again and instantly the railing bulked, as if trying to squirm away from his grip.

"Jesus" He muttered, drawing back and shooting a look of sheer disgust at the banister. Jobe kept his arms firmly locked at his sides as he climbed after that.

But if the banister was bad, the walls were a hundred times worse. Jagged nails had been lamely hammered into the wall but the carpenter had done a much better job at bending them than getting them to penetrate the wooden planks that had replaced the smooth plaster. Each of them was thick with dark, reeking grease, the heavy, and stagnant odder caused Jobe's stomach to somersault.

After what felt like an eternity, he reached the top step. Looking back, the two flights of rickety steps looked a hell of a lot shorter than they'd felt as he'd been climbing them…

"217." Jobe read the numbers on the door again for what had to be the third time. He looked back at the keys in his hand, just to make sure.

Standing here now, with all he'd been through to get here, it didn't feel real. After all his searching, he'd finally reached his ultimate destination…all that was left to do was simply put the keys in the lock and open the door.

Shakily, he raised the key towards his final obstacle, praying that it would fit so hard his head began to dully ache. If it didn't, he'd probably tare it down with his bear hands…

'_Click'_

He just left the key in the lock, its plastic key ring swinging freely and just stared at the door in a mixture of eager anticipation and bitter apprehension.

Taking a deep breath, he pushed the door open, his skull tingling madly as he stepped into Phil's room, he was still praying as he crossed the threshold.

But he didn't know why…

oooh, cliff hanger…

anyway, first off thank-you to JonWilhoit for the rather intensive reviews and your feed back is most appreciated. In regards to your first comment, I agree that I went WAY over the top in the 1st interlude but as we see in chapter 18, Leonard doesn't seem to give a damn about his daughter's well being. However, you are right in saying  that none would be eold enough to launch an attack like that out in the open.

Also, thankyou for pointing out the error I made with the shotgun. For future references, it will be a breach-loaded weapon. As for Jobe making typical 'horror film' errors…well what would be the fun in it if Jobe had just shot Vanity out right?


	25. What a wounderful world

Well, I already had this chapter written up and I though it would be cruel to leave you hanging like that…so here's the next chapter. 'Room of Angle' from the SH4 soundtrack is quite suiting for this chapter I think.

Chapter 22: What a wonderful world

The occupant of the armchair didn't rise as Jobe slunk into the room. Even though its stiff back was facing him, the man could still tell there was someone slouched in it from the grove that made the chair's backboard lean.

Jobe felt something he hadn't felt for a painfully long time suddenly fill him. It surged through and over him like a powerful torrent of water, absolving him completely.

Happiness.

Just the though of that words in these dark surroundings seemed wrong, but then Jobe saw that this one room hadn't been touched by the corruption that had seized the rest of the town in a throttling grip.

The walls weren't stained, nor were the floor nothing but a thin grate suspended over perpetual darkness. He could see all this in fine detail from the warm lamplight that bounced over every inch of the room, softly illuminating it.

Jobe didn't think he'd ever seen anything more beautiful in his entire life.

"Phil?"

The bulge in the chair shifted.

"I've been waiting for you…"

Jobe could have cried at the sound of his voice. He was about to rush to the chair when Phil finally rose from his soft nest, resting his arms over the headrest.

"Are you alright?" But Jobe could see for himself. Despite for his dishevelled blonde hair, Phil looked a damn sight better than Jobe. His light features hadn't been marred by the town's corruption yet and his eyes danced brightly in the light as he talked.

"Considering all that's happened to me, yeah, I'm good." He paused, letting his green eyes run up and down his companion. "But I think you've seen better days…"

"That doesn't matter, we need to get the hell out of here. Now." Jobe turned and started towards the door but halted abruptly when the sound of Phil's footfall didn't reach his ears.

"What's the rush, Jobe?"

For all his love for the man, Jobe could have slapped him there and then.

"What do you mean 'what's the rush', Phil? Haven't you seen what's going on in this town? It's madness, utter madness!" He felt his voice strain under the hurried urgency in his tone.

"Yes." Phil closed his eyes as the word slowly slithered from his lips and in that instant; Jobe felt that blazing hope begin to falter.

"Then you know we can't stay here…Please Phil," Jobe found himself suddenly filled with hollow desperation. "C'mon."

Phil just stood rooted to the spot, grinning.

"I don't think so, Jobe. It would be for the best if _you_ stayed here, I think."

Jobe felt as though someone had pored lead down his throat.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You still don't see, do you? None of this is about me, it's all about you." His words slowed as Phil saw the sideways look Jobe was giving him. "God, Jobe, you can really be so slow at times. Do I have to spell it out for you?"

"What's wrong with you?!"

A storm passed over Phil's feature's, darkening them as he scowled.

"Wrong with me?" He spat. "What's wrong with you, that's what you should be asking!"

Jobe gritted his teeth.

"Phil, Do you have any idea how crazy you sound? I came all this way to get you out of here, not to listen to you rant on like a mad man."

A muscle in Phil's face jumped.

"And why did you come all this way for me huh, can you tell me that?"

Jobe glanced at the heavens, exhaling sharply.

"I'm your friend. I couldn't just leave you here to die" Some deep trigger in Jobe's brain snapped. There'd been a great deal of blood in the car after the crash and even Father Parker had said what a terrible state Phil was in when he'd briefly caught a glimpse of him. How was it that the man standing before him was so spotless and intact?

"Aw Jeeze Jobe, you make it sound so tender. You sure you did it out of friendship, not some feeble act of redemption?" 

"What the hell's that supposed to mean?" He barked back. God, Phil was sounding more and more like Claudia with every sentence. He threw back his head and let out a bray of cold laughter. The sound of it made Jobe feel sick.

"Oh please! I of all people know what you've done. I really don't see why you keep up this façade; it's embarrassing more than anything else."

Jobe's mind randomly flashed back to a performance of _'Oedipus Rex'_ he'd seen with Phil and Julia, easily imaging his friend playing the role of the cryptic prophet, Thyreseus while he himself was the bemused, but ultimately damned king.

_'Him too, they've all accused you of doing something…Claudia, those three in my…well you wouldn't exactly call it a dream. Even Casper hinted that you would eventually see the light. BUT WHAT IS IT?'_

"You've gone…mad." Jobe stated numbly, not wanting to say the words but deep down he felt it was true. Each time he deigned to look into Phil's eyes, he felt the notion re-enforce itself when he saw the blank, glittering orbs glare back at him. "Please Phil, just put whatever it is behind you and come with me…" There was no response from his friend as Jobe looked at him pleadingly. He couldn't drag him out the room if he didn't want to go.

Phil simply turned his back on his former friend.

Jobe felt any of the final dregs of optimism drain from him. After all he'd gone through for him…

"Alright, I see how it is," He paused, not wanting to say the word that seemed so ultimately final but what else was there he could do? Jobe turned to the door. "Goodbye, Phil…"

He started for the door, trying to keep a hold of his emotions.

"And where do you think you're going, Jobe?"

The man in question stopped instantly, his friend's icy words so full of malice they rooted him to the spot. He turned back and instantly felt his mouth go as dry as a naked, picked bone.

"Tisk, tisk, tisk, you can't leave, you're the guest of honour! I think you're trying to shirk your responsibilities…" In the bare few seconds that Jobe had turned his back, something seemed to have filled Phil. Something dark…

'The town…' 

His skin seemed to stick to his bones, taking on a waxy, yellow hue and those insane eyes stared wildly from sunken hollows. Even his clothes looked warn…

"I don't understand why you would," Phil's voice rasped on, creaking like chalk on a blackboard. "It an honour to be able to serve god in the way that's been offered to you…" He grinned widely, his lips curling back viciously. They parted much further than they should have been able to, displaying teeth that glinted meanly in the mellow light.

"What's happening to you?" Jobe backed away, whatching his friend with malignant horror that spread through him like cancer.

Phil ignored the question and Jobe saw something crawl from his eye, scurrying quickly across his face before burrowing under his skin that was rapidly fading to a corpse-like grey.

"You know, I think I'm a little jealous of you, but hey, that's your department."

His cheek collapsed, the dead skin simply crumpling away to reveal yet more of those teeth. They looked horribly sharp…

"Yeah, I think I'd kill for an opportunity like yours…"

He slunk from behind the chair, slowly stalking towards Jobe, hands out-stretched. The jagged nails on the end were black with rot.

"But hey! That's what _friends_ are for!"

"Get away from me!" Jobe pulled the shotgun from its belt, aiming it with a shaky hand at Phil's head.

"Ohhhh," He crooned, leering maliciously. "No last hug for your old friend?"

"You come one step closer and I swear…I swear…"

"What? You'll kill me?" Phil stopped inches away from Jobe; giving him one last ghastly smile before lunging at him, mouth wide.

The handle of the double-barrel gun came smacking down on his skull, sending the barely human creature sprawling on the floor. Jobe looked down at thing that had consumed his friend, his eyes wide in disbelief.

_'Please don't make me shoot him, **please**…'_

"Oh come on…" It gasped, pushing Itself up on peeling arms, wild with creatures squirming between the ragged strips of flesh that coated them. "I know you can do better than that!"

With surprising agility, It leapt to Its feet and rounded on Jobe, slashing with It's nails at his face. Jobe tumbled backwards, hollering as his flesh seared where the claw-like fingers had raked his skin clean.

The thing called Phil laughed, throwing Its head back like a wolf howling at the moon and letting rip It terrible song.

"Well, that _was_ fun but I'm afraid it's long gone time for you to move on to better thing, Jobe…"

Jobe looked up through a mask of blood, hunched double over the shotgun.

"Goodbye, _friend_ …" A new lunacy bit Its eyes at It threw Itself at Jobe, claws outstretched greedily. Jobe straightened up as It collided with him…

There was a wet squelch as the raised nose of the shotgun meandered its way through Phil's decomposing gut. Its eyes went wide as it fell onto the firearm, more in surprise than pain, leaning heavily against Jobe.

"Oh!" It muttered dumbly, as if it had just witnessed a mildly odd spectacle. For a moment the pair were still in the bizarre embrace, then Jobe closed his eyes.

Father Parker started awake, jerking up from the chair he'd fallen asleep in. He sworn he'd heard a shot that dragged him from the realm of dreams. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the cause of the disturbance…

"Ah, Sister Wolf…" He smiled warmly as he watched the pallid woman make her way slowly up the aisle from the door, which she'd presumably slammed shut.

'I did not believe it could be possible for that woman to look anymore gloomy…' 

Yet she did. It was as if her own personal rain-cloud of guilt was floating over her head. She'd been like that ever since she'd got back from her little trip. He'd never found out what had taken place between her and that Heather girl, he'd have to ask before she drove him mad with grief…

 "You'll be glad to hear that the man, Jobe, I do believe is his name, gobbled up every word I handed to him like a hungry rooster on scattered grain." He paused, grinning at his companion. He got nothing in return.

Unlike most, his charm seemed to have no effect on Claudia and sometimes he found himself wondering if she in fact was the single most frigid _and _morbid creature on God's good earth…He'd certainly worked his southern magic on Jobe yet she was invulnerable to it, even if he'd practically nuked her with charisma. Needless to say, this small failure irritated Richard Parker immensely. If there was one thing he hated, it was failing, no matter how small. That and he would be able to sleep safe at night knowing he had the woman completely under control. It was vital that she complied in order for his plans to be carried out.

"I may be wrong in thinking so, but he is by far the easiest to manipulate out of those in our sphere of influence." He stopped when he saw that the woman opposite was looking at him in doubt.

"I don't know, Father... I fear a certain one of our number has been putting ideas into his head that may make him somewhat apprehensible" Claudia's sentence died faster than usual and she cocked her head as if locking onto a far away sound.

Richard sat bolt upright, moustache twitching.

"Is it done?" He asked like an over eager child.

"Yes…" She sighed. "All this pain…it is so sad that it is necessary."

"Yes, yes," Parker rambled, not heeding Claudia's melancholy epilogue. He rose and stretched like an over-fed cat, content of gorging itself.

"Come, Claudia, The party's only just getting started and there's formidable amount of work to still be done before _she _graces our present. Can I get an Amen to that?"

Claudia smiled weakly at the though of Alessa's coming, the sound of the harsh shot still ringing in her ears.

_'So very sad indeed…'_

By the time had turned back to Claudia to issue instructions, she'd already vanished.

"I hate it when she does that."


	26. Hello Darkness, my old friend

Well, E.P.O, you'll be glad to hear the next few chapters are just sitting on my computer just waiting to be put up but I think I'll space them out a bit. I'm glad that Phil's tranformation was as creepy as I intended it to be…

Chapter 23: Hello darkness, my old friend

'BOOM'

Miles away, Claudia jerked, as if the gun had been set off right next to her ear, yet somehow Jobe didn't seem to be able to hear the shot as it tore through his friend's middle despite being right in front of him. Nor did he see the torrent of innards that hit the adjacent wall with a wet splatter, dying them red in the crimson shower. All he could see was the look of agony that twisted his Phil's already corrupted face.

"I knew you had it in you…" He hissed like a dry breeze and fell back, sliding free from the shotgun.

He was still smiling when he hit the floor.

Jobe collapsed against the nearest wall and his legs gave beneath him, as if the bones within had dissolved away to some milky liquid. He felt sick.

The world swam before his eyes and he vomited dryly, trying to reign in the torrent of feelings that viciously yanked him this way and that. Above all, self-loathing rose above the others.

Jobe grabbed the shotgun, resting his chin on the double barrels, feeling the rings of metal bite eagerly into his chin. He didn't deserve to live after doing that…

But did he deserve to die?

He was already in hell. Surely being stuck here was a fate worse than any death. Slowly, he lowered the long gun. He stood up and softly, Vanity's final words came floating back to him.

_'Nothing but a monster…' _Yes, he could see that now.

"I'm so sorry" He whispered to the empty room for all the good it would do and vanished back into the hallway.

The centaur's fall had not gone unnoticed by one of the town's inhabitants. The creature that could have once been a dog had wondered into the lobby, enticed by the aroma of spilt blood.

It had its head buried in the corpse's gut when Jobe came down the stairs with his head bowed, lost in a world of memories that now tasted so bitter. He was brought back to this one by the sound of the dog's chops smacking wetly on ripe flesh. Jobe looked up and found himself untouched by the usually nip of fear.

"Kill me." He whispered, moving down the stairs. Jobe stepped onto the lobby, closer to the oblivious hound.

"KILL ME!" He roared and this time the dog's head snapped up, dyed with gore. Its sharp eyes fixed on him momentarily before it turned and trotted out the door, leaving Jobe to stare after it in disbelief.

_'Even they won't touch me.'_ He thought sourly. In truth, the dog had gouged itself to the point of bursting and couldn't be bothered with this strange, screaming creature.

Jobe followed it out into the now pale light that feebly strained through the sheets of falling rain, batting against the pavement to a rhythmless beat. With in seconds, he was soaked.

"What now?" He asked the empty air as he wondered aimlessly down one of the empty streets. He stopped.

Why should he satisfy this damn town by crawling into some dark corner? _It_ had taken Phil from him, tearing him away with greedy, eager fingers. It sure as hell wasn't going to snatch him up as well.

He was going to get out of here if it was the last thing he ever did…

"Jobe?" His head snapped up at the sound of the scarred voice.

"Virgil?"

Indeed, it was. The hooded girl crouched above him on a wall running parallel to the street. Jobe saw how she kept her head bowed low, a small river of water streaming from the peak of her hood.

"Did did you find him?" She peeked up from under the hood. She didn't need an answer when she saw the look on his face. "Oh…I'm so sorry."

"What for?" Jobe asked echolessly. It wasn't like she was the one who pulled the trigger…

"Well…" She garbled, trying to think of something to fill the empty sentence with. "For earlier. II don't' know what happened…"

'You tried to lop my hand off, that's what' 

"Don't worry about it. This place is getting to me too." He let out a short, soulless bark of laughter, just as cold as the near freezing air that swirled about him.

She leapt off the wall, landing beside him with a surprising grace he wouldn't have expected from her. Virgil got to her feet, yet still refusing to unfurl fully.

"So what are you going" Jobe cut into her submissive sentence.

"Shhhh" He held a finger before his lips and Virgil shut up, listening to whatever Jobe had tuned into. However, she found herself unable to hear anything over the endless patter of rain that seemed intent on drowning out anything else.

Wait…there was something. A low, monotonous rumble, and she could more than easily visualise the prowling abomination lurking in the mist from the obscuring air. The sound of metal on metal cut the air as Virgil pulled the kantana from its scabbard.

"No, listen!" Jobe's hand grabbed her shoulder and he began gently dragging her in the direction of the sound.

She grinded her feet into the slick wet ground, panic fluttered in her chest like a trapped bird.

"Have you gone _completely_ insane?!" She hissed, but Jobe paid her urgent tone no head. With a certain foreboding, Virgil began to wonder what on earth Jobe saw in 'Blue Creek Apartments'.

When he began to laugh, she really did begin to worry. Her hold on the kantana tightened and all the while, that chugging groan grew ever louder.

"Look!" He pointed to something through the rain. A large, ominous shadow lay where his finger fell. Without warning, he let go of Virgil and tore off towards it.

"Jobe!" She called after him but he'd already melted into the grey mist by the time she'd gathered herself. She took off after him but then the very air before her exploded.

Virgil threw her arms over her face as the harsh light engulfed her, skidding to a halt. Blinking furiously, she slowly peeked over her arm, her eyes burning in the glare of the sudden illumination.

"Come on!" Jobe's voice came from behind the large, blinding halo. "It's alright, it's only a van!" Something cheery had seeped back into his voice.

He pushed the side door open to reveal a soaking Virgil staring up at him with suspicious apprehension. Slowly, she crawled into the passenger seat.

"How…"

Jobe smirked.

"The key was already in the ignition. All we have to do is drive as far away from this town as possible…what's wrong?" He stopped when he saw the girl's quietly growing reluctance, festering away like a bad seed.

"II don't think I can come with you…"The word were so quiet Jobe barely heard them. Not that he wanted to.

"What?!"

She wheeled around to him, holding her hands up in a sign that implored peace.

"Don't think I don't want to, II just can't." She melted back into her seat, hanging her head limply. "Please Jobe, please don't make me…"

"Why?" Jobe asked monosyllabically, glaring over the dashboard at the rain cascading against the windshield. Virgil opened her mouth but abruptly shut it again, as if she couldn't quite shake the silent words from the tip of her tongue.

"What, you can't tell me? If it's that important why don't you just spit it out!" Jobe didn't mean to raise his voice, but after the day's events, he was finding it hard to act compassionately. He was sick to death with this town and the horde of skeletons in its deep closets.

"You…it…" She shook her head and made for the door handle. "Just go, it's for the best."

'_click_'

The lock snapped down.

"I've already lost someone very close to me, I'm not going to let this place ruin anyone else."

Before Virgil got a word in, he'd already slammed his foot down on the accelerator and the van lurched forward.

"Don't you understand?! It won't matter where you take me, it's still going to find me wherever I go and I don't want to drag you down with me!"

She broke into a furious fit of violent coughing as her mangled throat burnt from her passionate words yet Jobe ignored her plea, skidding dangerously into a corner.

"Or what?" He snapped sarcastically. "You're also going to turn into some freak and try to gouge my eyes out?" He turned again, the motion slamming the girl into the side-door. "At least let me drop you outside the town. I won't make you go any further than that, ok?"

There was a silence, filled only by the mechanical sounds of the van and the rain beating against it.

"Alright…" Her voice sounded small and defeated. Virgil drew her knees up to her chest. "Just go as fast as you can…please."

Jobe smiled to himself. "Nothing would please me mo SHIT!" His foot came down on the brake and the van grinded to a halt, throwing the pair forward. Jobe slowly lifted his head, praying he hadn't seen what he though he had.

He swore again as his eyes confirmed his initial, blurred sighting.

"What was that for?" Virgil slowly followed his locked gaze and then she too froze.

Out in the rain, someone horribly familiar was stood in the middle of the road…

"Run her over," Jobe broke his staring and looked at Virgil in shock of the aggressive notion in her words. "Run that bitch over…"

She stared transfixed at the figure she knew all to well, her eyes narrowed into fine slits.

"II can't just kill her…" It was Jobe's turn to find himself weak with words. As much as he hated Claudia, he couldn't just run her down like some animal on the highway.

"Do it now, while you still can." A tinge of naked terror crept in to Virgil's wavering voice. Jobe noted how tightly her hand was locked on the dashboard.

'She's petrified of her…' But what could the woman do apart from get in the way? 

"Hold on…" Jobe rolled the window down, sticking his head out into the cold morning air and squinted as the rain rolled into his eyes.

"Get off the road!" He called hoarsely through the ambient drumming. Oh yes, she was as likely to comply with that as someone was to come to Silent Hill on vacation…

The only move Claudia made was to raise her arms in a simple act of defiance, stretching across the road. Jobe saw this and sighed before he ducked back into the dry atmosphere of the van.

"She's not going to move…" He stated morbidly. He glanced at Virgil, her eyes still radiating malice as they stayed rigidly stuck on the woman. Her knees had started to dance as she tapped her feet against the floor to a mad beat.

"You have to…it's the only way for either of us." 

"…Just hold on." Jobe revved the engine in shallow hope it would scare the woman from the road. Needles to say, he wasn't surprised when she made no move to get out of the way.

Claudia squinted through the sheets of rain at the van; the sound of the mechanical roar finally reassured her that Jobe wasn't going to back down.

It looked as though she was going to have to employ a different ploy to halt this escape…

With a sigh, Claudia shut her eyes, wishing deeply that her course of action wouldn't be necessary.

Deep down, the woman knew it was. After all, she had worked so hard for this. She wasn't about to let these two pivotal figures go when her goal was so close to being achieved, even if she died trying.

"To hell with this." Something had snapped in Jobe's brain and he suddenly realised how pointless any more blood shed would be, even if it was their shared antagonists that was spilt. Anyway, it would be a hundred times easier just to take another road out of town.

That was when Virgil screamed.

The sound tore through the comfortable silence that had fallen over the car, shattering Jobe's concentration. He jumped, his foot wedging itself on the accelerator and the van ploughed forward. The oversized vehicle bumped and rose onto the pavement, its low base grinded against the rise of the kerb as Jobe swerved out of the imminent collision course he was on with Claudia. She went by as nothing more than a black blur against a background of pallid grey.

But the screaming hadn't stopped.

He glanced at Virgil but found once he'd taken one small glimpse, Jobe was unable to look away. Sheer horror trapped his eyes when he saw what was happening to her.

She writhed in her seat, pushing against the chair with fingers hooked into claws. Virgil let out dry gasp that rattled up from her throat, as if some invisible force was slow and mercilessly crushing her windpipe. She arched her back, letting out another of those moaning, death-like breaths and the hood fell back.

That was when Jobe saw the worst of it. And it was no longer the burnt skin or rancid bandages that made him want to look away in privet disgust and pity…

Her milky eyes had rolled all the way back in their orbs, and he could see the surface of them glistening as they thrashed too and fro. Her lips had ridden back, revealing bone white teeth clenched together tight enough to shatter. They grinded against each other like hard rocks, squealing like a knife on glass, the sound alone was enough to make Jobe cringe.

"Not again" Jobe's eyes zipped from the road to Virgil and he found him self-wishing he had time to kick himself as well. Hadn't this happened last time he'd tried to force the girl to do something? He should of let her out of the car when he'd seen what a state she was in…but noooo, he had to go and try to redeem himself for blowing his once best friend's guts out. Guilt, it seemed, only lead to more guilt.

"GAHHHHRAG!" The cry rose in her throat, a wet, and horse sound. Something else rose with it. A torrent of muck projected itself from her mouth with enough force to slam Virgil's head back in the headrest. The muted brown and crimson mass hit the windshield, showering her side with the sickly smelling gore.

"Holy" Jobe watched in muteness, trying to think of something he could do…

The tension suddenly seemed to leave Virgil's body and she sunk back into the chair, her head lolling limply on her chest.

'Oh GOD! She's dead…' 

"Virgil?" He tried; panic twisted his voice as he pleaded with the still body next to him. He could have kissed her when he saw her head jerkily lift itself from its resting place, her matted, black hair sliding over it. Her eyes slipped onto him, moving slowly as if she were some drunk woken before they've had time to sleep off the previous night's merriness.

Jobe felt the breath catch in his throat when his own caught them.

Gone was the soft, blind look that had previously occupied them. Instead, they had taken on a cruel, metallic quality that bored hungrily into Jobe. There was something else in them, horribly akin to the mad aspect that he'd seen in Phil's during that hideous transformation.

Her cracked and burnt lips were pulled back into a sadistic grin, the teeth unnervingly still now.

"Haven't you been paying attention?" A voice that creaked like ancient wood grated from her mouth, sounding far too low to come from Virgil's mangled voice box. "You can't leave YET!"

Before the final word had escaped her maw, Virgil lunged at Jobe.

The van screeched, riding even further up the pavement until it kissed the walls of the shops and houses that lined the street. The metal let out a hideous scream as it grinded along the brickwork, twisting and warping under the tremendous friction. It was a single lamppost that brought it to a halt, the bonnet of the high automobile wrapping around the sturdy post. There was the sound of glass shattering and then lonely street was reclaimed by silence.

You'd think your self-mad to believe such a seen had occurred on it only a few moments earlier…  

A/N: what, you thought I was acttually going to let him go that easily?


	27. Conversations with dead people and the c...

Seeing as people are launching threats against my noexistant hamsters, I'd better put this chapter up pronto. Aaaand by the looks of things, it's C.S Lewis time as we have another trippy dream sequence.

Conversations with dead people and the Cake Theorem: The third interlude

Part 1: A simple sort of lust

_'I'm dead now, aren't I?'_

The thought wormed its way into Jobe's mind as he swam back up to consciousness and the world slowly floated back into place around him.

_'I'm going to open my eyes and there's going to be a big red guy standing over me, just waiting to prod me with a pitch fork…'_

Or perhaps he'd open his eyes to find Phil standing over him, that sick, dead grin spread all over his face, still reeking of wet cloth and spoilt meat. Yes, that version of hell seemed far more terrifying that the traditional ye olde 'fire and brimstone'. Jobe opened his eyes, bracing himself for whatever may be revealed beyond the curtains of his eyelids.

There was no un-dead Phil leering back at him, only a ceiling pasted with curling paper. Jobe sat up, groaning at the dull thudding pain in his head and looked around.

He was in a room, and guessing from the cramped layout a hotel one at that. A double bed occupied one corner but it looked as though none had bothered to change the soiled sheets for aeons and the oppressive odder of dank mildew seemed to be the only thing that dared to lie within its blankets. At the other end of the room stood a lonely table, its stained surface baron, save for the domed room-service cover. Jobe didn't dare to lift it when he noticed the dirty brown tendrils creeping up over its chrome surface.

 The fact he wasn't in the van anymore gave him a clue of where this scene was going, especially after the last time he'd turned up in this hotel.

He sighed, rising somewhat reluctantly as his mind whirled back to the events before his arrival in…(_what was it that fat guy had called it? Oh yeah, I remember now_)'Nowhere'. However, before he managed to gather them, a moan from the bathroom by the door halted his train of though. He looked up and before he could stop himself, he was at the door.

The pure stench that assaulted his nose like a blow sent him reeling back. It smelt (and from his vantage point, looked) as though the toilet had decided to gradually regurgitate its fermenting contence, choking the room with the nauseatingly sweet aroma of shit. The brown muck had slopped over the edge of the once spotless porcelain bowl and swirled between the tiles in the toilet's immediate proximity. A swarm of bloated flies danced over the miniature swamp of faeces and other, unnameable substances.

And then Jobe saw the cause of the moaning.

The nurse from his previous visit was slumped against the bath, her red service-cardigan hanging languidly from one shoulder.   

"Lisa?" He hissed, pulling her name from his memory, with some effort. He stepped forward but stopped short of the rancid smelling toilet. A fly buzzed lazily past him.

"You're still here?" Her voice came out more as a groan than clearly formed words. "I was hoping you were going to get out of this place…" She lifted her head as if someone had pumped her skull full of concrete and tried with notable effort to flash Jobe a tired smile. The man couldn't help but gasp at what he saw.

She looked as if she'd been the object that halted the van's suicidal rampage.

Her eyes were blood-shot, livid veins running in a haywire pattern over their surface and the heavy lids kept on trying to slip over them. A deep, purple welt flourished under one, like some dark, forbidden flower, mirroring its twin that stained her forehead. A cut split her lips, its furious surface crusted over.

Jobe realised that he was gawking and hurriedly looked away, his face burning with quiet shame.

"I tried to, but…" He tried to finish his explanation but the image of her scarred face kept flashing in his mind like some distracting neon light.

"Mmm," She murmured in contented agreement. "I know what you mean…there's always something holding you back." Her eyes seemed to be focused on some far away object. "Whether its wanting or duty, something always seems to keep you here, no matter what you do…"

Jobe looked back at her forlornly. Even though it would take nothing but a step to reach her, she was a thousand miles away.

"Are you sure there isn't anything I can do?" He asked, praying that she might be able to offer some uplifting words, yet he seriously doubted it. Any hope faded when her eyes met his and she let out a soft laugh.

"I tried…the one rash move I took resulted in me looking like this and brought me a one way ticket here." She gestured towards her face, grimacing a smile.

"But… last time I saw you, you were fine."

"Yeah, its funny. Time here seems to flit back and forth. Bruises don't tend to fade to well in this place…" She trailed off before refreshing her gaze and Jobe saw the sparse hope that crept into her worn eyes.

"Please try to get away…before its too late for you and you end up like us."

Jobe had left the bathroom, Lisa's final words ringing hauntingly in his ears.

_'Before its too late for you and you end up like us'_

 Without warning, vehement anger flared within him, the passion aimed at both himself and _Virgil._

Just what the hell had happened back there? His one good chance of getting away and she'd wrecked it, damn well near killing him in the process. Thanks to her schizophrenic attack he was stuck in this god forsaken limbo with no clear way out.

Jobe shuddered, remembering the darkness that had filled her face just before he'd tried to rip his throat out. She was right when she'd told him she was nothing more than a monster, only now Jobe had seen the creature's true face.

With a throaty grunt, he slammed a balled fist into the wall as memories of Phil came back to him, stabbing at his heart with cruel, long fingers. Why did everything have to have so many sides?

He looked up and sighed bitterly. The air caught in his throat when he saw the figure silhouetted by the faint light that barely broke through the window dominating the opposite wall to him. He stood upright, blinking in mute disbelief.

"J Julia?" The word caught in his throat like a dusty cobweb.

_'It can't be…She's over seven hundred miles from here.'_ It had to be another of the town's cruel, heartless tricks as it tried to manipulate him even further.

But it looked so very much like her…

She turned, her auburn glowing softly in the smudged light. She smiled and that simple act alone crushed the nagging voice of question. Jobe, so eager for a break from the living nightmare that had swallowed him, body and soul, forgot momentarily how unreal it was. He was more than happy to chase a fleeting dream.

"What happened to you two? I've waiting for you for what feels like such a long time now."

Jobe found himself slowly moving towards her, as if her very words were the lifeline he'd been seeking for all this time. Finally, everything took its toll and he crumbled before her.

"I didn't want to, I swear to god I didn't but Phil…oh god, he didn't give me a chance"

"Shh…" She raised a finger to his lips, ceasing their frantic movement. "You don't need to explain it to me. I understand."

And with that, she kissed him. Nothing like the soft ones they'd exchanged before but a heated move that threatened to devour him with emotion. He simply returned it, closing his eyes, finally letting the insanity slip from his mind and sunk into it like a drowning man. For the first time in what felt like a painfully long stretch of his existence, Jobe felt as though he belonged.

That was, until Lisa's shrill cry shattered the moment.

He spun round, glaring viciously at the woman, a look of horror and disgust frozen on her face as she clung to the toilet's doorframe.

"Get away from him!"

He turned back to Julia…Only it wasn't she who lay in his arms.

He yelled, pushing Maria away from him as fast as he could but it was nowhere near as fast as he wanted to. The sweet flavour left in his mouth rapidly fermented like fruit left to spoil, leaving him with a dusty, rank taste on his tongue. It tasted of death.

She closed her eyes, running her tongue slowly over her lips.

"Mmm," She purred deeply. "Now that was good."

Jobe did nothing but stare at Maria, trying not to be sick as he tried to buckle down the foul distaste that clawed its way up his throat.

"What the **hell** are you?" He grimaced as he spoke; trying not to think of what he'd just done but it lurked within him like a foul after taste.

Maria slowly opened her eyes.

"I can be anything you want me to be" Her voluptuous smile was broken by another interruption from the nurse.

"You monster! Can't you just leave him alone?"

Jobe saw her roll her eyes before she rounded on the nurse, her lip curled.

"Don't tell me we're back to petty name calling, can't a girl get _any_ kicks around this place?"

Lisa shot her a look of sheer disgust.

"Kicks? You think this is fun? Oh god, you're even worse than I" But Jobe didn't get to hear the rest of the argument. He'd already made a break for the door in a mad rush, trying to out run the shame and feeling of deep sickness that weighed down on him.

He sailed into the hallway.

"Those two at it again?"

Part 2: Twenty Questions

Jobe stopped, his feet digging into the floorboards. He turned to see who had accosted him.

"They're worse than a married couple…" A second said. Jobe vaguely recognised it as the girl from his previous visit to this twisted plane of reality except this time she didn't seem intent on stabbing herself. She and her companion, the final and somewhat lardy member of the hotel's cast, sat on a set of stairs that filled this end of the corridor, the wood and walls around them looked as black and burnt as charcoal.

"We didn't think we'd be seeing you again…" The fat man commented, scratching at the blonde stalks of hair that protruded at all angles from underneath his cap.

Jobe could quite safely put his hand on his heart and say the same.

The dark haired girl motioned to him, beckoning him forward with a pale hand.

"Come here," She saw the weary apprehension cross his face and smiled timidly "we won't bite…"

Jobe slowly placed one foot in front of the other and inched his way towards the pair, the voice in the back of his head screaming at him to stop, asking if he hadn't learnt anything from the last time he'd tried to approach someone? Jobe found himself at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at the pair with a quiet fear, despite the fact they were possibly two of the most unimposing members of the human race, if only a little out of sorts.

"You're Jobe right?" The blond man squinted his already tiny eyes and the two orbs practically vanished behind layers of heavy skin. Jobe nodded slowly, sitting on the step bellow them and trying to let every thing sink into his already over-saturated brain.

"I guess you've got a whole stack of questions none's been able to you an answer without making your head spin, huh?" He pressed gently, his large fingers fumbling with the dirty blue and white t-shirt that did nothing for his figure.

Jobe turned to him, his brows furrowed.

"Who are you people?"

It was the girl's turn to answer.

"Well, I'm Angela and this, this is Eddie..." Her companion fired off a mock salute at the mention of his name. "And I must apologise for my rather unsociable behaviour for the last time we met…" She shifted uncomfortable as she saw Jobe's eyes flicker to the sleeve of her polo neck, the memory of the knife and blood suddenly vibrantly fresh in his mind.

Eddie lent forward, his heavy presence descending on the man.

"Not to cryptic for you I hope?" He grinned widely, his looming, moonish face practically splitting in two. Jobe felt his breath on him and couldn't help but shudder. It was colder than a hollow grave. "Surely you've got something a little harder for us? It's not like we get visitors often…" Eddie withdrew and fell back on the step, still grinning stupidly. On hearing his words, the question burst from Jobe like an overly full damn.

"What is Silent Hill, I mean, nothing here makes any sense. And what dose it want from me?"

Eddie whistled sharply through his teeth.

"What is Silent Hill…Now there's a question…"

The large man fell as quiet as the town itself, as if in deep contemplation. Jobe suddenly felt sure he wasn't going to get any useful information from the pair until Angela spoke up.

"We aren't really sure ourselves, that must sound stupid coming from people who've been here for so long"

"But we did come up with something," Eddie cut in; embers of excitement began to flicker in his dull eyes as he spoke. "It's easer if you think of the town like one great big cake"

This time it was Jobe who interrupted.

"A cake?" He repeated flatly, not quite able to believe he'd heard someone compare this damned town to something as harmless as pastry. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Angela roll her eyes at Eddie and shake her head.

"I told you it was a stupid idea," She muttered from the edge of her mouth.

"Well I didn't see you coming up with any better ideas that didn't give me a headache. Seriously, you shoulda heard some of the stuff she came up with, 'Nine Circles' my ass…now where was I…oh yeah!"

He cleared his throat perpously and sat up.

"Now, on the top of this cake, you got the icing. _Everyone_ can see that, no problem and it's just like that in the town. Hell, right now, everyone who lives in Silent Hill is probably walking around up there, they ain't got no idea what's happening on the next layer."

He took a pause, seeing another potential question swelling in Jobe's mouth.

"But I haven't seen anyone, save one or two people since I got here."

At this Angela smirked, seeming to have decided this 'cake theorem' was worth warranting.

"That's because you haven't ever been on that level, you've only seen the next circle"

"The sponge!" Eddie butted in again, leaving Angela to grit her teeth with exasperation. It was clear to see her understanding of literature wasn't shared by her some-what dimmer companion.

Oblivious to her stress, Eddie continued.

"Now," He said, with a sly tone. "It takes a certain kinda person to see the sponge."

He paused dramatically, leaving Jobe feeling obliged to fill it.

"What kind of person?"

And with that, Eddie was off again.

"Well, this town, it kinda calls out to people who can see it for what it really is. People just like you and me and her, and I bet my bottom dollar we've all got something in common." He smiled darkly. "We've all done something or got something in us this town can feed off, and 'cos of that, it needs people like us."

"And just what do you have that this town needs?" Jobe asked. Despite their poor construction, Eddie's words sounded fantastically philosophical…

"Sin, Jobe, I got sin. Shit, man, we all got it."

He felt himself go cold at the Eddie's concluding sentence, his mouth as dry as sand. Jobe barely heard himself ask the question.

"What did you do to end up here?"

"Me? Oh, nothing big, not compared to what some of the people around here have done…"Jobe noticed him staring at Angela from the corner of his eye and how she in turn had fallen dumb, shifting nervously on her stair.

"…But if you're really curious, I shot some guy, yeah, that's right; some dumb ass football player with a yap to match." Eddie relished the way Jobe shrunk back from him as he confessed and felt himself swell with pride. He wasn't going to be getting any crap from this guy any time soon.

"Don't forget the dog." Angela added contently, lancing Eddie's somewhat swollen ego.

"Anyway," He gushed, hoping Jobe hadn't heard her contribution. "After the sponge, you got the base of the cake and my god, do you get some crazy-ass-shit in there."

Jobe silently imagined this as the place he'd seen through Vanity's mirror. Eddie's crude description didn't come close to what he'd thought of it…

"Then, there's this place."

"The circle of Judas and his fellow traitors " Angela added, only to get a sneer from Eddie.

"I guess this would be the plate the whole damn cake rests on…"

 He let his voice trail off, for his speech was done and for a moment, there was silence. That was until Jobe couldn't help but pop another question.     

"What are you people? How do you know all this?"

Eddie held his tongue at this and Angela's shadowed eyes drooped. For a moment, the notion that he'd offended them deeply flashed through Jobe's mind and he shifted uncomfortably, feeling as though he'd just asked a blind person if they could see.

"What are we?" Angela echoed, her brown, misty eyes fixed on some far away point. "I don't think even we know that anymore.

"Are we ghosts? Trapped shadows of the town? Could we perhaps be another type of monster that lurk the streets, only with a more human face. Or maybe memories kept alive by the power of this place and by our own desire for redemption born from leading such painful, pointless existences…"

"Basically," Eddie picked up from the end of her sombre monologue. "We don't have a clue, for those of us who don't appreciate a touch of the dramatic."  Angela's eyes latched dangerously on to Eddie before moving on to Jobe. She bent towards him, uttering words in a low yet smooth voice.

"But I've got a question for you Jobe, and it's the million dollar one that's been on my mind ever since I met you. What have _you_ done to earn yourself a place here?"

Jobe's jaw clinched like stone at her words, reeking of suspicion and said nothing as she continued her unforgiving stare.

"Because, you know the only way you can ever escape from this place is to face up to them or they'll eat you up inside out." She paused, leaning back on her step. Jobe saw something catch her eye as she continued.

"And if you don't accept them, you'll never get past him…"

She pointed and Jobe heard Eddie mutter yet more of his usual prophanity as he turned to see what was at the base of the stairs.

He felt the bile in his gut rise when he saw the object of their avid attention.

It stood, staring at him with an eyeless gaze. The huge, iron helmet the creature wore looked heavy enough for its body to crumple beneath but instead it stood ridged and stock-still. The edges of the triangular-shaped gore coloured helmet looked sharp enough to rival the blade of the colossal knife that rested securely in its hand, gloved with coarse skin. It stood, the skin between its legs forming a web between them, giving the impression it adorned some sort of ceremonial robe constructed from its very dead flesh.

It took a lumbering step towards the group on the stairs; it's great knife squealing as it dragged its fearsome weapon over the cracked floorboards. It lifted the impossibly large sword over his head and it hovered there indecisively as if the red-judge contemplated their fate. Jobe felt the flat face of its helmet lock onto him and the knife came down.

He'd been judged and found guilty of his forgotten crime.

There was a groan as the staircase buckled under the force of the blow and fell apart, tumbling into an impossible darkness that seemed to reside directly under them. Jobe could do nothing as he fell, the eyes of the red-judge still on him as the darkness absorbed him. 

. 


	28. Stranger in a strange land

Gah, I hate this chapter so as a reward, I'm going to post the next one today as well. My computer decided to something really annoying and type this out in red which was extremanly off putting and almost resulted in me throwing it out the window.

That aside, it's time to meet the final member of the cast.

Chapter 24: Stranger in a strange land

"Hey?"

The muffled female voice cut through the darkness, yanking Jobe sharply back towards the light of consciousness.

"Hey!"

A tone of urgency crept into the nagging voice, this time the cry was far louder as if the cotton that seemed to have bunged up Jobe's ears had been ripped out.

"HEY, mister!" This time, there was a sharp pain that exploded across Jobe's numb face, tearing the man from the dark world of slumber.

"Owww…" He muttered, lifting his head slowly. The sharp light greedily fell upon his eye like hungry birds of pray and he winced, the gum refusing to clear from them. That was when he saw the blurry form of a person bending over him. His mind still swimming with weary delirium, he muttered the first thing that popped into his foggy mind.

"Julia?"

"You're alive?" It retorted somewhat stupidly and Jobe suddenly noted just how different it was to his girlfriend's. While hers was light and almost tuneful in the way it rose and fell, this one was full of coarse gravel that scratched at Jobe's ears. He braved the pain and opened his eyes a little more.

A scene of chaos came into focus around him.

The windshield was all but gone, save for a few jagged teeth of glass that clung stubbornly onto its frame, the rest of it littered all about him. Through the fractured windshield, Jobe could easily see how the van's bonnet had been twisted so effortlessly around the solid lamppost that now stood erect in its centre.

Jobe dully thought what effects this would have on his car insurance if anyone had been around to report it.

"Barely, by the looks of it…"He replied to the voice of unknown origin and turned to it.

A woman looked back at him, not much older than himself with large green eyes that were full of worry.

Jobe suddenly remembered the sharp stab of pain and lifted a hand to his sore face.

"Oh, I'm real sorry about that."

Jobe turned to her with questioning eyes.

"Huh?"

"Uh…well," She began, sounding almost embarrassed and pushing a long bang of brown-blonde hair behind her ear. "You're the first person I've seen since I got here and…well…for a moment, I kinda thought you were dead." She took a deep breath as rushed towards the end of her short explanation. "So I sort of slapped you to wake you up…"

Jobe stumbled drunkenly out of the van onto the slick pavement. The endless cascade of rain seemed to have ceased.

"That was very thoughtful of you." He turned to her and took a better look at her features as she pulled a packet of cigarette from the pocket of her denim jacket.

Despite her young age, any beauty she'd had in her earlier life had already waned over the years, burnt-out and spent like an overused candle. The light hair was pulled back into a pony tail, the grown out fringe falling to either side of her forehead that seemed a little out of proportion with the rest of her face, contrasting with her slender, snub nose.

Having plucked one of the white sticks from its cardboard habitat, the woman replaced it in the pocket of her jeans, exchanging it for the lighter that must have resided there.

"It's a good thing," She began, moving the cigarette to the side of her mouth as she lit it, its tip flaring. "That you stopped when you did. Any further and you would have gone right off the edge." She stopped and to a long drag from her fag.

"Off the edge?" Jobe repeated her last words, making sure he'd heard them correctly. He looked back to the van, his eyes tracing the invisible path the vehicle would have made, had Virgil not interfered.

Only, the road didn't continue with it.

In the length of time in which he'd taken that short trip to 'Nowhere', the road had sunk into another one of those deep, bottomless crevasses, filled with nothing but empty fog and shadows.

"Fuck!" Jobe's foot caught on a hubcap that had rolled free of the wreaked van and booted it viciously in to the gapping hole, whatching bitterly as it sailed off into the mist but doing little to vent his built up frustration.

The road he could have taken out of Silent Hill was gone, along with the only means of transport that ever so slightly raise his already dismal chances of survival. Oh yes, and now he also had this woman's (who seemed wondrously oblivious to what was going on in this town) welfare to worry about…as if he didn't have enough on his mind already.

He wheeled around and saw her looking at him with worried confusion over the glowing tip of the cigarette.

"Are you feeling alright?" She asked, and Jobe could hear the concern in her voice, the kind of concern for one's own health. That little display could have done nothing for her faith in his sanity.

"Yes, it's just…" He stopped him self from launching into what would be a damning speech about the horrors that stalked Silent Hill's misty streets. If she didn't already think he was crazy, she would after he finished explaining about why he was just so distraught over the loss of the van. "Are you sure I'm the only person you've seen here?"

She laughed curtly through her nose.

"I've been wondering around this place for hours and I haven't seen anything except for a bunch of crappy houses and lots and lots of fog. The place is totally deserted." She paused, the shadow of fear faintly pinching her. "This town…it's a ghost town." She stopped, flicking the spent cigarette into the nearby gutter; its illuminated tip continued glowing for a moment before the still damp pavement drowned it.

"What happened to everyone here?"

Jobe shook his head, wishing he had a sane answer for her question.

"I have no idea… It's been like this ever since I got here." He found his voice trailing off when he noticed that the woman was absorbed with eyeing his grisly assortment of accumulated wounds.

"Wow," She murmured somewhat tactlessly. "You really managed to cut yourself up quite badly when you crashed, huh?"

"Uhhh, yeah…" Jobe leapt on her assumption, silently thanking Virgil for providing him with such a believable alibi and letting his newfound apprehension and hatred towards the warped girl fade for just a moment. "Thank god for safety belts."

The feeble attempt of humour managed to raise a faint ghost of a laugh from the woman but all too quickly the oppressive silence of the town invaded their sparse conversation. The woman attempted to break it with a hollow cough.

"We should get inside before we both freeze to death out here." She tried, pumping her words full of a forced optimism. "There's a café up the road that looked open Well, not in the sense that the lights were on and there were people sitting in it…" She trailed off and hung her head with a grin. "And I'm just going to stop waffling on so we can go there and warm up, instead of stand out here and listen to me rambling on..." She stopped again, glancing at Jobe from the corner of her eyes that seemed to smile nervously. "You must think I'm stark raving mad, huh?"

Jobe found himself unable to stop a laugh escape from him at the irony of her comment.

"Oh no, you are by far the sanest person I've met here."

And with that one comment, you could practically hear the ice break. Some of the forced awkwardness faded from the woman, and she slouched comfortably, smirking to herself.

"Oh jeeze, that's very reassuring, considering there's no one else here!. Well you can stand out here for all I care but I'm going inside," She jested and made a start towards the mentioned building, taking barely three steps before glancing back over her shoulder at him. "You coming?"

"Sure…I'll be with you in a moment…" With that, he turned back to the van, making sure she wasn't looking before he began gathering the more dangerous items in his possession that lay amid the mass of broken glass, doing his best to hide them under his clothes (which proved to be an almost impossible feat when it came to the shot-gun and fire axe). Perhaps it would be for the best if he kept them to himself for now, after all, he didn't want the first person he'd met who didn't appear to have an unhealthy interest in religion or intent on stabbing him in the back run a mile screaming blue murder when they saw him come lumbering up, armed to the teeth.

Jobe turned to trace his new acquaintance's steps and found himself smiling briefly. Then he remembered where he was and all that had lead up to this point and the smile dropped lifelessly from his face.

Past experience didn't bode well for either of them.

E.P.O: Jobe's deeds will all be revealed…I can't really say shortly but we are beggingin to draw towards the latter parts of this story. Heh, I had a little too much fun with the conversation sceen, Eddie was so refreshing to write.


	29. Gluttony

Chapter 25: Gluttony

"My name's Grace,"

Jobe looked up from the sink that resided behind the bar's counter as he listened to the woman, icy water streaming down his face. He winced as it bit into his cuts but that aside, it felt wonderful to scourge his face of some of the clinging dirt that had built up on his face like another epidermis all this time.

Grace had been, to some extent, right in suggesting coming to the unlocked café (a rarity in the town of Silent Hill) to shelter from the near tundra conditions outside. Only problem was that it was only a bare few degrees above freezing inside thanks to the apparent lack of power in the town.

Still, it was better than nothing.

Jobe could have slapped himself for letting his guard drop so low and allowing Grace to go in by her self, but he'd been lucky; nothing had reared its ugly head upon the woman's entrance and they seemed to be alone…

"So what are you doing in Silent Hill, Grace?" Jobe asked, his head buried in a cupboard, rummaging through the dinner's stock of dusty, faded tins. Despite Virgil's memorable offerings, he hadn't had anything to eat since some pallid sandwich from a service station that tasted suspiciously of plastic and car-board but right now, he was hungry enough to eat the box it came in if someone were to offer him it. It would probably taste better anyway…

"Me?" Grace paused for what felt like a very empty gap between her words. A little too empty for such a straight forward question. Jobe looked up from the cupboard, a tin of what he guessed were tomatoes in his hand. Another darker question slithered across his still tongue.

_'What have you done to get yourself here, Grace?'_

"Well, I have a brother and I haven't seen him since he packed his bags and left home. I wanted to look him up, for old-time's sake, you know? Some reason, I thought he might be in this town but there's none here…" She looked around the dinner's sparse interior, leaning back on her chair. Apart from a few chairs upturned on tables whose tablecloths had been replaced with untold layers of vintage dust, they were completely alone.

"And it looks as though it's been that way for a long time." Grace observed dryly, running a finger over the table's ghostly surface and admiring the grime that concentrated on the tip of her finger.

"What about you…"She crinkled her brow trying to remember his recently given name. "Joe?"

"Jobe," He corrected, taking a seat beside her. "As for me, I was driving through when my car crashed. I've been trying to get out of here ever since." It may be a slight variation of the truth but it would lead down a road ambushed with a smaller number of questions.

Grace's brows shot up.

"You mean that van I found you in wasn't yours?"

In all his time fighting nightmares, Jobe had forgotten about the trivial ethics of human's, however, Grace quickly saved him from wracking his brain for a plausible excuse.

"Do you think I care? It's not like anyone around here's going to miss it." Jobe laughed weakly but halted abruptly when he saw the mirth drop from her face. "But seriously," She continued, the chair legs came down on the greasy floor with a heavy 'clunk'. "If you're planning on splitting, you mind if I tag along?"

Jobe saw something in her eyes that silently begged for him to say 'yes', something she would never allow to creep into her steady voice. It was naked desperation.

"Sure, this place is creepy enough on its own and it would be nice to have some company for once." Jobe said, trying hard to keep up the façade that everything was hunky-dory.

'Not the kind of company who tries to decapitate you or reduce you to a stain on the road…' 

Grace smiled, but it was more than easy to see that she was holding back. However, despite whatever she may be leaving un-said, he was glad she'd asked him instead of the other way around. Some women had a common trait of being wary of strange men offering to accompany them out of the blue. But given the current situation, one could be forgiven for throwing caution to the wind.

Still contemplating, Jobe began to fish around in the open can with a lonely fork he'd saved from the solitude it had been enduring in an empty draw.

"Please tell me you're not going to eat that…"

Jobe's jaw stopped moving. If he'd been in her position a day ago, he would have said the exact same thing.

"They taste fine."

Apparently, with these few carefully chosen words, he had awoken the neurotic hygienist within.

"They taste fine? Do you have any idea how long they could have been there?! You could contract salmonella or something!"

Jobe snorted.

"From tomatoes?"

Grace rolled her eyes.

"Whatever, did you even bother to look at the expiery date?"

The fork dropped back into the can, rattling against its wet sides, he could afford to humour her. After all, if mouldy food was the kind of thing that made he stomach turn, Grace was in for a very rude awakening. Jobe decided he would enjoy the eye of the storm for as long as he could.

"Ok, ok. These tomatoes have been off since…"But that was as far as he got. His pupils rapidly dilated as they scanned the can's print and Grace saw him go ridged before she smiled contently to herself.

"Don't say I didn't warn you."

But Jobe didn't hear her. He was to busy trying to repress a scream kept locked in place behind clenched teeth, for there was only one word on the back of the can, printed in bold, gleaming letters.__

_Gluttony._

Jobe leapt up from his chair as if he'd just sat on a pin, glaring at the can. From the look on his face, it might as well have bitten him.

"What"

"We have to get out of here, NOW!"

Grace looked at him, an expression of perplexing confusion drawn upon her face.

"What are you" This time, it wasn't Jobe who cut her off mid-sentence.

'BANG' 

The sound of something slamming into a hard surface flash-flooded the dinner. Jobe froze, his breath catching in his throat.

'It's already here…' 

Grace jumped up from her chair, staring in the direction of the sound.

"The hell?" She muttered, her eyes locking on the store cupboard that seemed to be containing the source of the noise.

'BANG' 

It came again, louder than before and this time the cracking of wood was clearly audible. Jobe didn't hesitate to pull the shotgun from where it had been stuffed (somewhat uncomfortably) between his shirt and trousers and cocked it, the sound wonderfully crisp and reassuring. Grace turned to him with eyes as wide as dinner plates.

"Oh my"

She began to back away from Jobe, temporally forgetting about the raging anomaly in the storeroom, her attention focused on the long firearm that seemed to have been produced from nowhere.

Before the door finally gave with a piteous whine, one terrified though flashed through Grace's head.

'He's going to kill me…' Then it was gone, like a flare of light in the dark as splinters of wood rained across the room, exploding out from where the door once stood. 

Grace ducked, turning back in time to see Jobe fire into the dark cupboard, the shot briefly illuminating the room as a hellish mew of inhuman pain erupted from it and for a moment, everything was blissfully calm.

Jobe turned to her, a look of aching guilt clearly visible on his face. His lips moved to say something but Grace never got a chance to hear the unformed words.

There was a tremendous crack as the wall around the now gone door bulged and buckled, the very plaster coming free of the wall as the cupboard's occupant ploughed effortlessly through it.

Jobe raised the gun again, firing at the huge shadow lumbering towards him through the cloud of frantically dancing dust and crushed plaster, rewarding him with another bellowing howl.

The manufactured fog settled and Jobe got his first glimpse at the Sin.

Acers of pallid, white skin met his eye, folding around a somewhat human build like waves of water. Every now and again, a strip of brown cracked its surface where the fat had been packed so tightly the skin itself had ripped apart under the gargantuan stress.

It dwarfed Jobe by at least a third the man's height and from where he stood, he could barely see the tiny head that stared blankly down at him for the expansive gut, dropping down low between its knees. Those themselves sagged and Jobe found himself thinking it was a miracle the beast could even walk, let alone build up enough speed to barge its way through a wall.

That was the last thing that went through his mind before Gluttony's solid arm smashed into him, the gross limb sending him flying into the nearest table.

Grace watched in mute horror. For some reason, her legs refused to comply with the frantic order to move from her brain, which in turn was too busy trying to process and salvage some sort of sense from what she'd just born witness to. Even though she had lead a far from sheltered life, nothing in it could have possible prepared her for this.

The giant rounded slowly on her, clenching a tiny fist encircled by a ring of fat that practically engulfed it. Its eyes fell on Grace and she felt her insides shrivel up to nothing but dust.

Those shark-like eyes were all but lost behind slumping brows that were dragged down the creature's face, unable to resist the pull of gravity. Tiny, narrow teeth protruded from its fat and pouting bottom lip, a river of mucus-yellow saliva dribbling between its corners and the crease of its chin. This, along with its flat cheeks swallowed up its neck, blowing out like a frog's air sack.

The little mouth twisted itself into a wicked grin that simple said _'I'm going to eat you…'_

"Grace!"

Jobe's gasping shout was all it took to break the hypnotic stare. Both pairs of eyes flashed over to the nest of smashed chairs and tables that had painfully broken his fall as he crawled out from the mess.

"Run, get the hell out"

Despite its hideous mass, Gluttony revealed just how fast it could shift its weight if it wanted to. Grabbing the nearest chair, it effortlessly hurled the seat at Jobe so fast that the flying projectile was nothing more than a brown blur. The man barely had time to duck behind another table as the chair smashed again the pile of its wooded brethren, shattering and fracturing against it.

Grace didn't need to be shouted at again to get moving and lunged at the caf's double doors, skidding dangerously on the tiled floor as she ran haphazardly towards them.

She launched herself into them, bracing herself for the searing kiss of pavement.

Except for the fact that the doors didn't budge one inch and instead, she harmlessly bounce off them and hit the floor, hard.

For a moment, she did nothing but lie there, trying to refill her winded lungs and come to terms with the dull ache that gripped her arm. That was until she heard the sound of Gluttony's approaching footsteps through the floor, each menacing 'thud' growing louder in her thumping ears. Grace turned her head buzzing with the delirium of fear and adrenalin, only to be greeted by the flabby trunk that was Gluttony's foot. Slowly, she traced it up till her eyes reached its summit. It was still grinning that hungry, childish smile.

It bent towards her; a chubby hand tipped with minute nails reaching greedily towards her.

Grace had heard over and over again how your entire life is meant to flash before your very eyes before you die. Obviously, that was just another lie churned out by the movie industry because all she seemed to be able to think about was how funny it was that she was going to be eaten by the 'Michelin Man' from hell.

The hand brushed against her face, its taunt skin the texture of rubber but that was as close as it got.

It paused.

And then a piercing wail erupted from its podgy face, splintering Grace's eardrum as she asked for the nth time what the FUCK was going on.

Gluttony's leg crumpled beneath it, the skin dyed a glistening red.

Grace's rather unspectacular flight into the double doors had distracted the lumbering giant long enough for Jobe to get behind the hulk and burry the axe's sharp head into its thigh with as much might as he could muster. He pulled it out and slashed at the limb again and again, ribbon's of blood streaking from its serrated edge.

The Sin tried to turn on him but stumbled, its feet desperately trying to keep a hold on the floor slick with its own blood. It stumbled fatally, going over its centre of gravity.

Grace's eyes went wide as she saw it tip horribly slowly towards her as if someone had turned on the slow motion effect. She all but managed to roll out of its way before it smashed into the spot she'd been laying in only seconds before. Shakily, she got to her feet, still staring at the walking mass as her heart hammered away at the back of her throat.

She tried to say something but the words just wouldn't come.

"C'mon, we need to find a way out of here."

She nodded dumbly at Jobe's gentle words and turned to follow him to find another way out of the café now that the conventional one had been blocked off. He couldn't help but glance at Grace (who looked as though she was trying not to be sick) from the corner of his eye as he began to walk away.

'Damn, that must have been one hell of a start for' 

Something locked around Jobe's ankle and he went down. Grace spun in time to see the tiny, white hand yank his feet from beneath him and slowly start to drag the man towards the upturned head, its gross features twisted by wrath.

"NO!"

Grace jumped, coming down on the hand with a converse-clad foot with all she had. Even though she didn't weigh much (Jobe had silently noted to him self how petit she was.) there was a satisfying crunch of bone as they grinded together beneath the skin.

It howled, the smashed hand flying open and Jobe took off, grabbing Grace's thin wrist as he bolted towards the toilets. As they sailed through the doors, he glimpsed over his shoulder. To his horror, Gluttony was already struggling to its feet.

Grace saved herself from tripping as they stopped abruptly in the small room, glancing around frantically.

"What now?"

"Through there." Jobe pointed to a tiny window left adjacent, visible through one of the cubicle's open door. "You go first." He turned to the door, swapping the bloodied axe for the shotgun; franticly re-loading it while Grace jumped onto the toilet and dove through the window. She grunted as she wormed her way through the painfully tight hole, the wooded sill grating against her hips and side.

Jobe's eye flew from the door they'd been watching with a hawkish intensity when a curt scream shortly followed by a 'thud' cut the heavy air.

Grace had vanished from the window, gravity having carried her the rest of the way out, and he eagerly dove for the free square of grey light. He'd already got his head and shoulders out into the open air when there was the sound of crashing wood behind him.

"Help me!" His eyes shifted nervously to the woman, snapping her from the hold the sound of Gluttony's internal entrance had on her. Instantly, she grabbed a hold of the green material of his shirt and viciously tried to yank him free. He began to inch through, the arm with the shotgun slid out but it was never going to be fast enough by any stretch of the imagination. Jobe could see it in Grace's eyes as she valiantly tried to drag him through the window, biting her lip with effort.

Something else locked onto Jobe's thrashing leg but it wasn't the hand from before.

A million needle daggers's seared his calf, clamping down on his leg with a merciless force.

Grace fell back as Jobe screamed, the sound pregnant with ruptured pain. The army of vicious teeth came down again and he writhed against the narrow window in a vain attempt to free himself.

Grace leapt to her feet and grabbed onto the man again. No matter how much she pulled him, he just wouldn't come free…

Her eyes landed on the shotgun.

"Wha?" Was all Jobe could manage between screams as Grace tore the shotgun from his hand and ran off down the back ally the window looked out on.

'She she's left me here to die…' 

The though flashed through his mind before it was yet again absorbed by the overwhelming pain as Gluttony's teeth came down on his leg.

Jobe barely heard the thunderous crack of the shotgun behind him, only aware of the brief gap in the pain that wracked his leg. The next five shot came more clearly, each one louder than the last as the mist of hurt started to clear. There was a silent pause, broken only by the sound of a hideously large dead weight hitting the floor while slow, dragged footsteps faded away in the background. Jobe finally came free of the window, tumbling towards the earth. For a while, he could do nothing but lye there and try to build up the courage to look at his leg. Fortunately, Grace provided him with a brief distraction. The woman walked towards him, dragging the shotgun listlessly behind her. Her eyes were focused on something a million miles away, a black expression of shell shock on her face. Stripes of Gluttony's crimson blood ran over it while the denim jacket was now mostly a sickly shade of brown. She sat down beside Jobe like a tonne of bricks and for a blissfully long time, each of them tried to come to terms with their separate injuries. The one's invisible to the naked eye ran so very much deeper… 


	30. Keys to the Kingdom

There's an added picture of out two recently acquainted sins in my profile but without further a do, here's the next chapter.

Chapter 26: Keys to the Kingdom

"I'm not going to get a sane answer if I ask you what that thing was, am I?"

Jobe looked up from where he lay on the ground at the spot where Grace sat. Only silence hung heavily in the air between them. "Thought not…" Her head sunk dejectedly behind her knees.

Foe someone whose world had been turned upside down in the blink of an eye, Jobe thought she was taking it quite well. With a grunt, he sat himself up and finally built up the courage to take a look at his leg. The good news was that it wasn't as bad as it felt. The bad news was that it felt as though his lower leg had felt as though it had been all but stripped of flesh.

His trouser leg had been soaked a muddy brown, the little material that wasn't torn to ribbons saturated with blood. Through the gapping holes in the cloth, countless vibrant red teeth punctures were clearly visible; each was weeping tears of stark crimson blood.

Jobe suddenly found himself feeling very light-headed.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Grace's voice asked again, the concern welling in it. Something hadn't quite rung true in his voice the first time she'd posted the question and she'd just seen him recoil when he'd peaked at his leg.

"Absolutely…"

"Jobe, I've known you for what? The grand total of ten minuets and already I can tell you can't lie to save your life." She got and walked towards him. Jobe tried his best to shift it subtly out of her direct line of vision as Grace knelt down next to him. "Let me see."

"It's perfectly fine and I'm not about to start taking health advice from a woman who thinks you can contract salmonella from a"

"Oh my God!"

Despite his best efforts to hide the worst of it, she'd still seen.

"It's nothing!" He snapped at the prying woman, dragging it further away from her wide eyes. They couldn't afford to waste anytime getting out of here worrying about a mere flesh wound.

"Nothing?" She echoed hotly. "It looks as though you fell into a meat-grinder! Can you even stand on it?"

"Of course I can!" gritting his teeth, telling himself that his mind was only playing up the throbbing pain. Grace watched cynically as he shakily rose to his feet, his face set in an expression of grim determince as if his very existence depended on proving the woman wrong. He stood up at his full height…

…For about two seconds before the mauled leg crumpled like paper beneath his weight.

"Ok, maybe it's a little sore," He grudgingly admitted, a gross understatement if there ever was one. "But we really can't afford to stay in this town for any longer…you saw that thing in there with your own two eyes, didn't you? Well that's only the start of it! This place is packed with a whole horde of freaks just like that one…" Jobe cut himself before he started to rant and took a deep sigh. "I 'm just saying, we should forget about this and try to get out of here as fast as we can, ok?"

"And just how do you plan to do that if you can't even walk?"

Jobe opened his mouth to fire off his reply only to find he didn't have one at the ready.

"Anyway," Grace continued, intent on destroying any argument he my have built up. "What would be the point if you finally did get out of this place only to collapse from blood-loss or septicaemia?" She folded her arms, waiting for his retort. There was none.

"So what do you propose we do about this?" He nodded to his leg, trying to ignore that the wounded appendage felt as though it was on fire. Sullenly, he had to admit Grace was right. If they didn't do something about it soon it might as well turn out to be just as lethal as any of the lumbering abominations that called Silent Hill home.

Grace's folded arms dropped to her sides.

"I'm not to sure…" She saw the flash of restrained anger flash across Jobe's eyes and hurriedly offered a rushed answer before he exploded. "I guess we should bandage it up to stop the bleeding?"

"With what?"

Grace scanned the dank back ally for something, anything that could be salvaged while asking herself if this man was always going to be such damn –stubborn pessimist. Her eyes fell on her ruined jacket. Even though it was cold enough to think twice before licking the nearest lamp post, Grace wouldn't miss the coat that made her look as though she'd just done a particularly messy shift in an abattoir.

She slipped the coat off her shoulder and gave it one last look goodbye before grabbing it by the now frayed shoulder and viciously yanking the worn material apart. Jobe watched as she tossed the jacket into a near-by trashcan and turned to him with the limp piece of denim dangling from her hand.

"If I get hypothermia, I'm so going to kick your ass."

The two hobbled from the ally out onto the open street as if doing some bizarre three-legged race, moving painfully slowly as Grace tried to support the man draped over her, leaning heavily on the shotgun Jobe had presented her with.

"How…much…further?" She gasped, wheezing like an old woman as they hobbled down yet another foggy street, their feet dragging on the slick, wet tarmac. They'd only been moving for what couldn't have even been five minuets and already, her tar-clad lungs were just about ready to pack in on her. For the umpteenth time since she'd started, Grace wondered if she should seriously consider quitting smoking…then she remembered how much she wanted a cigarette right now and pushed the idea to the back of her mind.

Jobe looked at the map in his free hand, wincing each time his foot came down.

"Not to far…it should just be down the next road."

Since accepting Grace's proposal to try and amen some of the damage inflicted to his leg, a light had gone of in his brain and he dimly recalled Virgil mentioning something about a hospital. On opening the map, he'd seen that she hadn't been spinning yarns, and there was in fact not just one, but two hospitals in the town. Despite being spoilt for choice, 'Brook Haven' was considerably closer than the other and the vote had been unanimous.

"So…" Grace puffed in an attempt to make some type of conversation that would momentarily distract her from the slow feeling of asphyxiation, "What's up with this town?"

"I don't think you'd believe me if I told you."

"Please, after that thing in the café I wouldn't doubt it if you told me Elvis lives…"

Jobe feet suddenly stopped dead and the small woman only just managed to stop herself from introducing her face to the pavement. "Wha?"

"Did you…" Jobe stopped himself, the expression of bewilderment on Grace's face clearly saying that she hadn't heard the sound of yet another pair of feet on the pavement behind them that belonged to neither of them. He shook his head; perhaps his mind was just playing up on him in petty revenge for subjecting it to the twisted atmosphere of the town. "Never mind."

Jobe shot one last look at the fog behind them, half-heartedly expecting to see some monstrosity standing with open arms, ready to pounce, but there was nothing there save the empty grey air. He gave a dismissive snort, glowering at the concealing billows of fog before they continued their awkward pilgrimage down the street.

"What was that all about?"

Jobe hung his head, pulling his lame leg behind him. "I thought I heard"

This time they both stopped.

Jobe twisted his head painfully fast over his shoulder, ignoring the yank of momentary pain as his muscles protested, in time to see the fleeting black shadow melt back into the fog. Grace felt the sudden tautness that flooded his body.

"What?" She snapped her head over her shoulder, furiously trying to get a glimpse of whatever it was.

"Let's just keep going." Jobe urged, his voice had gone horribly quiet as he whispered quickly. Grace felt the flesh on her back creep at the sound of it and didn't protest.

They'd barely moved when the thing burst, howling, from the fog.

"RUN!"

Jobe's yell wasn't needed; Grace was already frantically dragging him up the street before the single syllable left his mouth. He stumbled, desperately trying to match the remarkable burst of speed that he'd never expect the woman (who only seconds ago was having enough trouble walking, let alone running) to be capable off. Human desire for self-preservation can be a wonderful thing at times…

There was the sound of cracking glass as their faceless pursuer propelled itself into the air and came smashing down on one of the dejected cars that cluttered the pavement like rusting litter. Grace saw nothing but a ghostly siloet as the straggling pair put another few meters between them and it. There was another squeal of metal as the thing jumped from the roof of the car, twisting the roof even further.

Jobe saw it looming out of the fog like some great black hole, intent on swallowing them up in the overwhelming darkness of its form.

Without thinking, Jobe whipped the nearly spent handgun from his belt and plugged a final round into the beast's chest and the Drowned hit the floor with a wet thump. He didn't bother to see if it stayed down. Grace began to slow, curiosity taking the edge off the blinding terror that frayed her nerves like a drug.

"DON'T STOP!" he pushed her forward and the pair continued their mad race towards 'Brook Haven Hospital', the tall building now visible towering over its shabby neighbours, standing out almost proudly from the eternal fog that choked the town.

The sound of inhumanly fast footfall began to hammer away again behind them, the Drowned's tattered feet madly pounding the pavement. Jobe and Grace bolted up the hospital's gravel path, pushing each other toward the derelict building's open door, all the while the rabid thing was feverishly snapping at there heals. Jobe caught the door as they sailed through it and propelled the heavy metal panel shut, sending a vibrant echo up the empty hallway. His legs finally gave on him and both he and Grace when sprawling on the slick lino floor.

There was a final roaring impact as the Drowned lunged in vain at the door as its pray was swallowed up by the hospital before a deathly quietness slipped over the place.

They didn't call it Silent Hill for nothing.

- - - - - - - -

A/N

E.P.O- I'll agree, it's difficult not to draw the simerlarities between the 'insane cancer' and 'gluttony'. Once you've seen one fat blubber monster, you've seen them all. As I said before, I came up with the idea for this story and the indivdual 'sins' long before SH3 came into existence so when I first saw an 'insane cancer' it was like "damn…"

For a clue as to the next sin, take a peek at chapter 8 of a story called 'Story's End' by Q1

Rodarian- Grace's role in the story will be reveald…eventually.

Snickers- don't worry, Casper will be making another apperence in a chapter or two. Lol, by now, Jobe should probably be dead.


	31. What are we but actors on a stage?

For those of you waiting for Casper's grand return…well, here it is.

Chapter 27: What be we but actors on a stage?

Grace picked up her head and feverishly scanned the hallway before her, flicking the bang that was softly stabbing her eye out of her face.

There were no faceless monstrosities staring back at her, only a short hallway that gave the impression that the hospital's janitor had packed up his bags with the rest of the town's citizens when they all decided to do an exodus en mass.

Jobe shakily rose to his feet, collapsing into the nearest dust-caked wall as his leg sang in bitter protest.

"I guess we need to find where they keep all the medical stuff here…" Grace commented in a far away voice as she eyed the darkness suspiciously, as if at any moment it she expected it to scream 'boo!'

"Grace, we're in a hospital. I really don't think it'll take us too long." He could practically see her rolling her eyes through the back of her head.

"Good, then let's patch you up and get outta here. This place can't be healthy and the sooner I see the last of this town, the better." She fell in behind Jobe as he began to shakily work his way along the wall, there shoes clacking numbly against the tiled floor. She shivered, feeling as though she was wondering deeper and deeper into some ancient mausoleum, a festering house of old decay. The place certainly smelt dead enough…

Jobe had always hated hospitals with some deep, unfathomable dread to the extent that when he was young, he'd almost put himself in an early grave after his appendix ruptured, insisting that he had nothing but a stomachache while his own body slowly poisoned itself.

It wasn't the doctor's or any of their questionable methods of curing whatever ailed the body, in fact Jobe had never before been able to place a finger on what it was that terrified him so.

But now he could.

It was the smell. In Silent Hill's nightmarish atmosphere it had amplified it to the point where the foul odour singed the skin in Jobe's nose, the overpowering scent of harsh chemicals and familiar aesthetic tang made his head spin. But there was something else that made him want to tare his nose from his face, a deeper stench that lay just beneath the acidic medical reek.

The smell of sickness.

Each time he breathed in, his mind harped back to the god-awful stink that occupied the sewer tunnels that ran haphazardly beneath Silent Hill's street like dormant basilisks.

"Huh?" A voice pushed Jobe's scrambled thoughts out of his head.

"I said why don't we try this one, first door I've seen that looks as though we just have a hope of opening it." She winced as Jobe's flashlight caught her face, momentarily illuminating it a ghostly white as he made a move towards the door. In that short space of time, no longer than a single heart beat, he saw how the town had already begun to wear away at her. Wide, dusty, bloodshot eyes had caught his, looking as though they hadn't blinked in a long for fear that would be all the time the darkness around them needed to swallow her up.

The door handle clicked obediently as Jobe twisted it, the forging sound breaking the wan image that had burnt itself into his mind's eye. Grace bit her lip as she watched Jobe slowly draw the fire-axe from his belt, pushing the door open inch by inch and peering desperately through the ever widening crack. After a taught moment, she saw his posture loosen considerably.

"C'mon, it's empty." The pair slunk in like two small children moving through their house in the dead of night only if they were caught, their punishment would be a hell of a lot worse that a tanned hide.

The room opened out into a dank square, both walls lined with neglected, unforgiving beds that did nothing to entice you to sit on them with full confidence you wouldn't contract a skin disease but to be frank, Jobe didn't give a damn about that as he flopped onto the nearest one.

Ignoring the springs that jabbed at his ass through the crusty sheets, he watched Grace as she rummaged through a lonely cupboard, the only other occupant of the dreary room besides the brick-like beds and themselves.

The woman's brow furrowed as she scanned the contence of the dusty shelves, the grey powder multiplying out of control and colonising every inch of visible wood. Most of the bottles were caked with the stuff in rich layers so thick she couldn't read the tiny print and she didn't recognise the bare few that were still legible.

'Well what did you expect? To find a box claiming to cure wounds caused by the Pillsbury Dough-Boy? Way to go, Grace.' She would have continued this self-scolding for never paying attention in those first aid lessons when something else caught her attention. Grace pulled her head out of the cupboard to make sure she wasn't hearing things.

She wasn't.

Every second, the crisp, regular sound of hard shoes slapping against the hospital's tiled floor grew ever louder and the sound of voices now floated up the long hallway into the room. Grace felt her heart skip a beat.

Jobe' s head also pricked up at the approaching sound, his face contorted as he tried to make out the voices but Grace never gave him the chance.

"Quick, hide!" She hissed sharply, her hushed words cutting the air. Jobe's mouth opened to question but the look on her face silenced him. If her words hadn't pleaded with him then the expression on her face sure did as she stood fidgeting anxiously on the spot, she looked as though she'd seen a ghost.

The footsteps were notably closer, the raised voices bouncing madly off the wall. From their tone, Jobe wasn't too sure he wanted to meet the owners either.

"Where?" He asked, glimpsing about the room. There was nowhere that you wouldn't stand out against the barren backdrop. Grace chewed her lip frantically, the very same question on her mind and then she did something Jobe would never have thought she would.

She dove under the nearest bed, slipping into the shadows and out of view, the cold floor biting through the thin tank top she'd donned that morning. From under the bed, she watched as Jobe followed suite, worming his way (with a little more difficult) under the opposite bed. He'd barley had time to turn off the flashlight and drag his feet into the darkness before the door was thrown fully open.

From his hiding place, Jobe watched the pair of men's shoes flap their way into the room, one pair notably larger than the other.

"I hope you know I am thoroughly disappointed in you, my boy." Jobe instantly recognised the voice as that of the Southern preacher whose acquaintance he'd made in the church what felt like years ago. He would have crawled out from under the bed there and then but the shady image of Grace stopped him.

The larger pair of shoes shifted uncomfortably.

"I am sorry zat I have failed you, Father…"

Casper's tail-tell accent floated down from up high.

"No Casper, It's not that…but can you just imagine my disappointment when I received that phone call from you telling me you had the girl in your company, only to find you wondering about this town like a lost sheep on your own? It is crushing to say the least…" Parker's feet shifted around, clacking dryly against the dirty floor. "We're so close now, my boy" Richard's voice began to rise with an angry excitement. "I can almost taste it now but thanks to your bumbling efforts, we now have three wild cards to take care of."

"Three?" Casper sounded as confused as Jobe felt. Parker's feet stopped pacing.

"Well first, there's that brat of Sister Wolf's who's been as receptive as a brick wall to our teachings. I don't see why the woman takes so much interest in her, even though she can exert some sort of control over her at times. She's a lost cause if I ever made acquaintance with one."

"Sister Wolf has very poor judgment…" Casper cut in, his comment sending Parker into a fit of hysterics, the almost manic sound echoing around the room.

"HAHAhaha…amen to that, amen to that, but still, we must respect her decision. Anyway, the second has very recently made his way into this town. A man named Jobe"

"Jobe? I have met this very man. I had no idea he vas of any importance but I sent him to zee church…" Father Parker's cool tone quenched Casper's rant.

"And I am so very grateful that you intervened in this way. Thanks to you, we were able to direct him to his… final destination if you will, in hope that he would awaken from the fantasy he's buried himself in. Unfortunately, he still seems to be living in ignorance…" There was a creak as the mattress above Jobe sagged, its groan accompanied by a sigh from the Father as he sat down.

"And the of course, there's your Grace…" Jobe felt the breath catch in his lungs at the sound of his recent aquatance's name. He glanced across the floor at the woman who seemed to be listening to the conversation with visibly growing horror.

"Well, you know all about her, don't you Casper? And you're going to find her again for me, aren't you?"

"Zat bitch ruined my life!" With a roar, the gentle natured Casper rounded on Parker, his shoes squealing on the slick floor. "I'm going to find her and deliver her to God personally, even if it takes mien last breath to do it!"

Grace tried to stop the choked scream, the shocked mumble escaping through the hand she vainly slapped over her mouth to repress it. The muffled whimper broke through, no louder than a whisper.

But it was loud enough.

Suddenly, everything went deathly quiet.

"What in the name of all things holy was that?" Parker sat up, straining his ears. Grace clamped her eyes shut, praying with all her might that they hadn't heard her.

'ohpleaseohpleaseohplease'

She opened her eyes, in hope she would be able to make some sort of communication with Jobe…only to find a very different pair of hard eyes staring back at her.

"Vell look at what we have here!"

This time, she let the scream free.

Jobe was in the act of springing from his hiding place when three turns of events halted him, all initiated by Casper's hand. It shot under the bed, splaying out like a huge spider making a mad grab for its pray, his long bony fingers just kissing Grace's cheek as she wormed her way further back under the bed. In wild desperation like that of a bated beast in its death throes, she lashed out the only way she could, catching one of the spindly, eager fingers and biting down on it so hard that even the muscles she didn't know existed in her jaw sung.

It had the desired effect.

The hand was snapped back as Casper reeled himself backwards, howling with a bastard mixture of agony and surprise right into Father Parker who had been in the midst of rising. The two collided, tumbling in a mass of limbs back on to the bed that squealed like a stuck pig, caving under their combined weight. Jobe had made the unfortunate decision to raise his head just at that precise moment, receiving the full brunt of their fall as the web of springs above him crashed down on his head, setting off an explosion of colourful pain inside his skull.

Grace had already pulled herself free from her hiding place and bolted for the door, tearing into the dark corridors of the hospital by the time they'd hit the bed.

"What are you waiting for?" Richard screamed at the man who lay across him, momentarily transfixed by his bloodied finger. "GET HER!"

Casper snapped his mind away from his stinging digit, ignoring the slow, pulsating sensation as if his very heart beat within it and leaped up from the bed. Parker watched him go with a sneer.

"Idiot" He muttered to himself as he rose, dusting off his black shirt before striding purposely from the room.

All the while, Jobe lay curled up under the bed, clutching his head as if it were about to detonate. By the time the mist of pain had cleared enough for him to see straight, he was completely alone. No Parker, no Casper and most importantly, no Grace…

With the clogs in his mind still whirling as he tried to make sense of the conversation he'd just born witness to, Jobe staggered out the room but there was one thing that shone like a scorching light of clarity. Parker had used him, yet another actor to add to the cast list along with Casper.

Jobe felt his face warp into a wrathful snarl as he limbered down the hallway as fast as he could carry himself but another question raised its head: WHY?

It was only after he turned the first corner that he realised that he had no idea which way Grace had gone.

A/N: Yes, Jobe should probably be dead by now…but then, what would be the fun in that? Oh, and the drowned made its original appearance in part 14, falling apart.


	32. Sloth

This opening of this chapter was written in collaboration with Q1, author of the now completed 'Story's End' and Moroi belongs to her in all her insane glory. Go read it as it's a great piece of work.

Chapter 28: Sloth

"Grace" The name died on the man's lips as the door clicked too behind him, sealing the room in that o so familiar, velvety darkness that held all of the hospital rooms he'd checked so far captive. It looked like this was going to be yet another dead-end. His finger quickly scurried towards the torch suspended from his shirt

_'What was that?' _The eager digit paused, hanging over the switch as Jobe strained his ears in the darkness.

The noise came again, the sound of someone taking a low, raggedy breath of the room's stale air.

Something seemed to freeze in Jobe chest with the coming of the revelation that he was far from alone. He paused, rabidly debating weather or not to turn on the flash light if only to find himself eye to eye with one of Silent Hill's less passive inhabitants.

He took a breath, rested his clammy hand on the smooth handle of the shotgun and flicked the switch…

There was no one before him. In fact, apart from a covered gurney, he appeared to be the only inhabitant of the grimy room.

Jobe turned to leave, all to eager to dismiss the breathing as some figment of his imagination but stopped.

The cover on the empty gurney twitched, it's stained surface creasing ever so slightly but it was enough to make Jobe stop in his tracks. Slowly, he raised the twin barrels of the shotgun till the metallic cylinders were level with the trolley and watched the blanket.

He must have been stood like that for two minuets, listening to the drumming of his heart before there was another ripple of material.

Jobe could taste the salt on his lips as he wet them. Reluctantly, he let a hand fall away from the gun and reached for the blanket.

He tore is off, quickly pointing the gun at the space between the gurney and the floor

Only to find him self-staring down the sleek, black barrel of a handgun.

"Leave me ALONE!"

Jobe finally managed to look past the firearm's head and into the narrow, yellow eyes of the owner. The girl' thin lip twitched as she jerked the gun at him viciously.

"Get away from me or I I'll..."

Jobe stepped back, whatching with fearful fascination as the girl squirmed out from beneath the gurney. The starchy white uniform of a hospital inmate clung to her thin, almost scrawny body.

She jumped to her feet, keeping the gun trained on Jobe as if her life depended on it. If it hadn't been for her apparent agility, Jobe would have found it hard to believe the oriental girl wasn't on the brink of death. Now she stood there before him in the glaring arc of light, the fresh splatters of gore that dotted her uniform crimson stood out painfully, suggesting she too had been more than exposed to the towns dark side. Her slender shoulder heaved as she breather rapidly, her eyes flitting over every inch of Jobe with a speedy lunacy but the gun never left its target.

The man noted how unnaturally big it looked it her hands. She shook the messy locks of un-kept dark hair from her eyes as she regarded him, ignoring the clump of what may have once belonged to one of the hospital's warped staff.

"Who are you?" She looked sideways at him and it was plain as day the girl trusted him about as far as she could throw him.

"I'm just looking"

She shook her head, and groaned sharply, reinforcing the fact that it was _she_ pointing a gun at _him_.

"Nnnnnn No. Who are you?"

Jobe warily watched the wavering gun as he spoke; her feet had begun tapping an impossibly timed song against the floor like an insane metronome. Jobe found himself wondering just what kind of hospital this was…

"Please, I'm not going to hurt you…just put the gun down."

"That's a funny name," The girl cut in, a twitchy smile forming on her face. "Kinda long though…"

'And I though Virgil was one flight over the cuckoo's nest…' 

"My name's Jobe…" The man offered dryly, hoping it would be enough to appease this odd young girl. Surly, she slowly lowered the gun. The tapping cut off abruptly and her feet lay still on the greasy floor.

"Oh, that's a bit easier to remember. Ok, Jobe, why are you here?" A slightly cheery tone crept into her voice, some of the tension seemed to leave her stretched body, as if Jobe had been assessed and dismissed as a serious threat.

"My friend an I, we…ran into some trouble." Jobe nodded his head towards the crude bandage wrapped around his leg. Perhaps it would be for the best if he skipped the exact details for now, even he didn't know what they were…

"Where is your friend now?" The girl asked innocently, her honey eyes scanning the room. "They aren't here now, are they?"

"No, she's not. I lost her…" Jobe's voice trailed off. The girl looked up at him with concern.

"Are you ok?"

Moroi barely had time to move out of the way before the dark-skinned man collapsed on top of her like a bag of sand.

At that precise moment the woman, know as Grace, slumped against the wall, taking great ragged breaths.

She would be lying if she claimed to have a clue where she was. After all, running down practically identical hallways as fast as your legs could carry had a tendency to get you lost.

_'Yeah? Well you try staying in one spot when there's a homicidal maniac after you…'_

Grace stood upright, trying to ignore the stitch in her side.

God, did she need a cigarette. And Jobe…why did he have to insist on holding onto that shotgun? She would have felt a lot safer if that crazy zealot came after her when pointing one of those at his head...

Pat pat pat pat 

Grace's head shot up as the sound of foot steps came echoing down the hall.

Pat pat pat pat 

They were to fast to be Jobe with his newly acquired limp…that only left one person.

"Shit" She hissed quietly. Slowly, her hand groped the nearest door handle. It clicked open effortlessly. With a grin of success, Grace looked at the door and the smile instantly fell from her face.

Across the wooded panel, one word had been scrawled across it.

SLOTH 

Her eyes barely had time to register the word before the door flew open and the darkness was let lose on the unsuspecting woman.

She didn't even have time to scream...

With a groan, Jobe slowly came too. His head felt as though someone had run a steamroller over it…

He opened his eyes, only to find a pair of piercing amber orbs staring back at him intensely, surrounded by a face masked with dried red streaks.

"Are you ok?" The girl stared at him with a degree of concern as she perched lightly on Jobe's chest. The man blinked, trying to re-arrange the jumbled mass of thoughts slopping around the inside of his head.

"No."

Then it hit home with god-awful clarity.

He'd seen the whole morbid scene, Grace had opened the door and…

_Sloth_; the word echoed in his mind bitterly. Wherever Grace was, she was in dire need of help and soon.

The skinny inmate leapt from the man's chest as he quickly got to his feet.

"What's wrong?" She cocked her head, watching as he made his way briskly to the door.

"I was just feeling light-headed, that's all." Jobe yanked the door open, ignoring the mind-splintering yelp as it dragged over the floor.

"You're worse than that old Mr. Kaprow in M3…He's always asleep."

Jobe stopped, hanging onto the door.

"Room M3?" He echoed.

Moroi's eye's shot wide open.

"Oh, but I wouldn't go there. Mr. Kaprow hates being disturbed"

For all the genuine fear in the small girl's voice, her advice fell on deaf ears. Even before she'd finished the sentence, the man had gone, slipping effortlessly into the shadows of the hallway.

Alone, in the dark, Moroi sighed.

"Come on!" The man's voice echoed up the empty hallway, rebounding off the dark walls. Jobe stumbled along, trying to put a mental block against the red-hot messages flitting between his throbbing leg and brain. Yet no matter what technique he employed, it still seeped through and totally absorbed everything like a heavy red mist.

However, there was one thing that managed to shine through the fog of pain:

'Grace' 

The image of her final moment before whatever it was that lurked in M3 snuffed her out like a candle replayed and Jobe found he unconsciously walking that little faster. He'd crawl to that room on his stomach if he had to…

Out of the corner of his eye, Jobe registered the number printed on one of the rusting doors in fading print, almost chipped out of existence.

M11

Jobe began to lurch painfully down the hallway, leaning on the shotgun as if it were some obscure walking stick

…M7…

He felt the crust of sweat on his forehead loosen as his skin began to ooze.

…M5…

Jobe reassured him it was _only_ the gross physical exhurtion that was making his flesh drip and his heart jump to a tap-dance beat as if pure adrenalin had been pumped into it.

…M4…

It was a bear faced lie.

Jobe stopped outside the door that supposedly held a 'Mr. Kaprow' within. He was sure something far worse lay inside; the man would quite happily bet his life on it. Morbidly, Jobe reached into the pocket of his shirt, searching for something he could load the shotgun with and plug into the beast that had snatched up his newfound friend.

He withdrew his empty hand having found nothing save dust and grit, his jaw set awkwardly hard. It had never before occurred to him just how fast he'd been chomping through his precious reserves of rare and now extinct ammo.

"Well shit, I'm going to have to do this the old fashioned way…" Jobe laid the un-fertile shotgun down, propping it against the wall before pulling the axe from his belt.

Venting all the frustration, fear and pain that he'd suffered and endured, Jobe let lose a scream and threw himself through the door.

Effortlessly, the darkness swallowed him.

"Bastard!"

The girl we have come to know as Virgil stumbled back, hitting into the hospital gurney that polluted the hallway with its off-metal sheen. The girl grabbed her arm, ignoring the shooting pain that ravenously gnawed on it.

The scalpel that had inflicted the wound glistened wickedly in its owner's malformed hand, its tip stained with crimson. Wait, in its hand? It _was_ the hand, or at least could be as the flaky skin around it had melded itself to the medical instrument like molten metal.

Virgil waited for the 'doctor' to lung at her again, ducking to the side as its arm, clad in the sleeve of its filffy lab-coat, flew past, the knife stabbing nothing but empty air. Virgil pulled the kantana up and it effortlessly plunged into the out stretched arm.

There was a dry thud as the dismembered limb hit the tiled floor, causing a small, cracked smile to cross her face as she heard the repressed scream that rattled the good doctor's throat. She took one last look at the doctor's mouthless face before bringing her beloved sword up, deep down enjoying the way the metal blade reflected in the sub-human's wide, black eyes before thrusting the kantana forward. There was a soft crunch, smothered by the layers of tainted skin as the sword rammed its way through the doctor's thin flesh, shattering bone and piercing soft brain tissue before re-miring victoriously from the back of its head in a spurt of vibrant gore. With a twitch of both arms, the sword was wrenched upwards by its owner and cleanly cut its way out of the bony hollow.

For a moment, the doctor stood. With in a single breath, its legs crumpled beneath it as if the very bones had been ripped out and it collapsed lifelessly on the floor.

Virgil stood, panting but unable to stop the twisted smile from yanking her lips as she admired her handiwork, her eyes gorging themselves on even the smallest detail as the milky orbs following the rich burgundy rivers that flowed between the tiles.

_'Art…'_

The simple thought was severed by an oddly human roar and suddenly, Virgil remembered why she'd come here.

Jobe stumbled to a halt, blinking violently as he tried to force his eyes to come accustom with the surprisingly deep darkness that filled the room like the still, ink-black water at the bottom of a well. Slowly, like a picture coming into development, the details of the room began to slowly reveal their secrets to him.

The minute ward was bare and Spartan. Jobe bit his lip out of raw frustration, born from the fact that the girl's lead had been as empty as this room, well it had been a bit of a wild assumption, hadn't it? With a disgruntled sigh, he turned to leave.

And that was when he saw the beds.

Each and every one of them had been piled up against the wall, leaning against it in some manic structure that managed to stretch around the perimeter of the room. Blankets, pillows, drips, nothing had been spared in the construction of this random inner wall.

Jobe was beginning to suspect he'd got the right room after all…

"Grace?" He let out a horse bark of a whisper as he limped as quietly as he could, glancing with flitting eyes from bed to bed, his fingers dancing on the axe's hilt as he moved about the structure.

"Murrgh?"

Jobe froze, his feet squeaking against the grimy floor as he strained his ears, debating whether or not he'd actually heard the plaintive mew, and all the while still scanning the pitch-black room. His eyes finally found what they were so desperately seeking.

"Grace!"

There she was, lying on of the beds that lay vertically against the wall, and he felt a chill when he saw how much her position looked like that of Christ during his last moments. For someone with a wounded leg, Jobe sure did manage to cover the distance between the two in a remarkably short time. At first, he couldn't work out how the seemingly lifeless body was managing to stay up against the unclean, stained matters until his eye caught what looked like a leather strap wrapped round each of her wrists. He tried to ignore just how deeply they bit into her flesh as he tried to loosen them.

Grace lifted her head, glaze and dopey eyes meeting Jobe's, the simple action revealing another of the leather bonds strapped tightly over her mouth.

"Oh thank God you're alive!" I"

It was the look of sudden terror that streaked across the woman's face that silenced Jobe, that, and the sensation of something alive and moving against the tender skin of his hand. He looked at the crude maniacal that he'd been working on and felt fear creep into him, stabbing him behind the orbs of his eyes. The leather strap shot forward and before he was even aware that it had moved, the strip of material had encased most of his arm and in that moment, Jobe was suddenly noticed just how warm it felt, as if blood was pumping just bellow its tarnished surface. He went to grab it with his free arm, only to find that it refused to respond. By the time he saw the strap that had wound its way around it, Jobe could already feel another pair binding his legs. Effortlessly, the strands hoisted him up into the air, tossing him up as if were nothing more than a rag doll. His head smacked into the low tiled ceiling and the man howled as his skull made hard contact. He felt the axe slip from his clammy fingers as his head rung like a rusty church bell. His rope-like captors gave a vicious yank and he felt his head great against the ceiling as they dragged him vindictively across it.

Jobe forced his eyes shut, praying that it would stop.

As if by magic, it did.

Jobe opened his eyes. It took only second for him to scream when he saw what lay before him. He was hovering over one of the filthy beds, its occupant staring back at him, a horde of the leather strands spread out over the dull bed sheets and coiled up on the floor like dormant serpents, each one seeming to originate from the shadow that lay beneath him.

Even in the dim light, Jobe could still make out the sharp curve of its ribs beneath a paper-thin layer of skin, matted with clots of dried gore. He could almost see the guts stretching and convulsing underneath the taunt skin of its stomach, wile the lanky legs that stretched from a hideously bony, erect pelvis looked as though they'd snap if their owner tried to stand. The long, meatless arms trailed off the bed, falling into the shadows beneath the bed where the horde of serpentine tendrils lay dormant.

It was the head of the beast that caused the scream to reprise itself over and over again in the man's throat. The oddly overbuilt neck held it up at an awkward angle and Mr. Kaprow, better known as Sloth, watched Jobe with deeply sunken dusty eyes that peered out from a hollow of drawn skin. The skin that clung to its face seemed to have been all but eroded away, leaving nothing but jutting bone. Sloth's lip had disappeared, drawn back to reveal black gums holding numerous, sharp yellowing teeth captive. The bottom jaw was cruelly elongated, spanning out past the point of being useable until it came to a rest between the slump of its ribcage, fangs erupting at all angles from it.

But somehow, the creature managed to find its voice.

"Sleep" it said, and Jobe felt the leathery vines that held him start to stretch apart.


	33. And then there were three

'Art of Grace' section has been added. Sorry this took so long to put up but this chapter was giving me HELL.

Chapter 29: And then there were three

It had to be the worst thing Grace had ever heard. The sound of Jobe's cracked scream made her writhe all the more against the living bonds that held her captive as she strived to break free like a rabid dog. The low shriek did nothing but whip her into frenzy, stripping her mind of all but one though.

_'HELP HIM!'_ So absorbed by it that she didn't even notice the warm trickle that had slowly started to flow out from underneath the leather-like straps that firmly held her. No matter how hard the little voice in the back of her head screamed at her, her efforts were futile.

And all the while Jobe screamed.

Grace began to sob, falling flat against the restraints, and like a person stranded in a huge mass of water, finally let go, sinking into the overwhelming sense of defeat.

'_Shhhnip'_

The tears stopped. Grace's head instantly perked up like a startled rabbit's as the bonds on her left hand fell away. She looked up in time to see a flash of metal, sparking in the dark before the tight rope that wound itself round her right wrist were cut loose and she fell forward onto the shadow before her.

It caught her against its cold, damp body and Grace felt for a moment if she'd fallen into an old, dug up grave. The smell that rose from whatever garment it was wearing did nothing to break the elusion.

She looked up into the dark shadowed face, a hood falling flatly over it shading every feature in perpetual darkness. The only thing she saw was her own reflection in a pair of eyes that mutely glimmered like frosted glass.

For a brief moment, a crazy notion flitted across her mind that the angle of death had come to usher her off to the darkness but a refreshed scream from Jobe pushed this delusion far to the deep crevasses of her mind.

"You gotta help him, please!"

The faceless stranger glanced Grace over before breaking away and charging suicidaly at the bed that bore what could have once been a man named Mr. Kaprow. Jobe's tormentor twisted its crooked neck and there was a momentary break from the howls as its tendrils slackened. Jobe panted heavily, trying not to pass out as his body continued to scream at him. It was probably all the pain that gripped his muscles but he could have sworn he saw a glimpse of naked fear twist the deteriorated muscle structure of Sloth's face before an impossible expression of hate and frustration clouded its features as it examined the new comer.

"Why must you interfere?" The voice that rose from the gaping hole that served as a mouth was nothing more than a dry whisper, as if the beast was trying to speak as it inhaled. Jobe willed himself to turn his head to see what, or rather who, had yanked Sloth's rag. The man lifted his head but that was as far as he got to identify the newcomer as gravity finally caught up with him and he fell.

8 8 8

Grace didn't waist her time sitting around, she'd already done enough of that to learn that it almost certainly lead to a near-death situation and she'd had more than enough of those in the last two hours to last her a life-time.

Her saviour had de-accelerated to a slow trot, approaching the bed with what looked like some kind of sword drawn and ready. Grace caught sight of the fallen fire-axe, the sharp edge of its head glinting in the low ambient light as if winking and whispering in a smooth voice _'come on, Grace, pick me up. You and I, we'll have a whale of a time!' _The offer seemed very attractive.

The woman lunged for it as Sloth suddenly became aware of the ever growing shadow in it peripheral vision. It turned its head and felt one of its worn, ruddy eyes twitching.

"Why must you always interfere?"

Grace scooped up the axe and charged haphazardly towards Sloth's bed, skipping over the ever-thickening forest of leathery tendrils. She was going to cause some serious damage to this lazy son of a bitch and she_ was_ going to have a 'whale of a time' doing it.

She swung the axe with all her might at the closest vine that held Jobe captive and suspended limply over Sloth, grinning as if she belonged to be locked away with Moroi, Stanley, Leonard and the other inhabitants of this institution.

The axe sliced through the dry vine, severing it effortlessly. So unpredicted was the action that Sloth screamed, dropping its captive as its gasping roar of pain blasted through the room. Jobe landed directly on the frail copse, muffling its cry of protest.

Grace refreshed her psychotic smile, raising the axe high over her head as she prepared herself to bid adieu to Sloth's gnarled foot…

…Well, that was until she felt something moving against her own.

She looked down, just in time to see something rush with unprecedented speed towards her face. She only managed to get the "Oh" of 'oh shit' out before the tendril smacked her full in the face, sending her head snapping back. Grace actually managed to see the spray of blood that shot from her nose rise above her in a crimson arc as she stumbled back.

_'This is all the axe's fault…' _Was the last coherent though to scramble through her swimming brain before she hit the ground, consciousness fleeting like a dream.

"GRACE!" Jobe leapt from the bed, not giving the stranger a second thought as he stumbled over the wasted limbs of the Sin. He felt one of the twisted vines wrap itself around his waist and rip him from the bed, launching him head first into the nearest wall, the only thing that saved his skull splintering instantly on impact was the unforgiving bed that caught him.

Sloth watched with mild amusement as Jobe slid numbly down the matters, collecting in a heap on the floor before turning its drawn face back to the person who stood by the bed.

"What?" It wheezed mockingly, its ribs rising and falling erratically. "Have you come to kill me?" The hooded figure remained silent, slowly raising the oriental sword she grasped tightly. "I see…" Sloth continued, narrowing its eyes to nothing but vicious white slits. "Well, I'm afraid you're going to have to try a lot harder than that!"

Virgil registered the brownish blur out of the corner of her eye as one of the tendrils lunged at her. She jumped forward, knees banging against the hard metal rail that held the bed together as the living vine whipped through the air where her head had been only seconds before. She glowered down at the wasted figure on the bed, the kantana twisting in her hand as she drew it up, the o so sharp point aimed at its chest.

Without blinking, she brought it down, savouring the sound of tissue ripping apart as the metal blade carved its way through its gut. Sloth screamed again, arching its back as it tried to come to terms with the sudden pain that tore directly through it. For a moment, it struggled against the sword that had impaled it, pinning it to the bed like some butterfly in a collection.

Sloth turned its rigid neck, its weeping eyes locking with Virgil's.

"This rebellion of yours is pathetic!" It spat, choking on its own words. "Do you really think _you _can do anything to stop the rise of god?" It panted, whatching the girl for any reaction as the room fell quiet except for the sounds of Grace slowly stirring back into life.

"No."

"Then why do you persist?"

"Because I can." Virgil grimaced and twisted the sword as hard as she could, ripping the thing's stomach to ribbons.

There was no scream this time, only a long dry gasp as Sloth went rigid and dug its bony fingers into the bed's sodden matters. Slowly, the eyes began to glaze over and the fingers gradually let go. Virgil pulled the sword free, wiping the blood off onto the moth-eaten sheet that stretched across the bed, silently whatching the deep crimson stain that spread out across it from underneath the 'fresh' corpse before turning her attention to the woman.

Grace had already propped herself up, gazing up at the figure who towered over her.

"You you killed it…" She mumbled in disbelief as she struggled up to her feet, her feet slipping on the tiles as the rubber soles refused to grip onto the slick floor. The figure remained silent, ducking its hooded head as if trying to shrink back from Grace's curious and awe-filled gaze.

"You're bleeding…" Virgil muttered, her words barely audible. Grace raised a hand to her nose and winced as her fingers brushed against it, setting of a sharp sting but she did her best to shrug it off. She'd been damn lucky to escape with nothing but a broken nose, had Jobe been as lucky?

"Jobe?" Graced wheeled around, desperately scanning the room for any sign of her companion. Virgil broke away from her side, slowly stalking towards the opposite wall, her eyes fixed on the curled up form of the man that lay at the base of one of the beds. The girl crouched down beside Jobe, gently rolling him over as Grace drew up behind her, whatching with fearfully anticipation.

"Is he…"

The man's eyes fluttered open and there was a pause as Jobe blinked, trying to clear his vision.

Then he planted his balled fist unforgiving into Virgil's face.

The girl tumbled back clutching at her feet as Jobe jumped to his feet and rounded on her. Grace dove out the way as he thundered past her on his warpath after Virgil and for a moment all she could do was gaze after them, her jaw hanging slack as she was absorbed by bewilderment.

"You goddamn BITCH!!!"

He lunged at the girl with a fist, snarling with contempt as she shifted out of harms way, holding her hands out, the very gesture imploring peace.

"Please, Jobe, you have every right to hate me"

"Damn right I do!" His fist sailed again, connecting with her check. His other fist went to follow its brother's path…only to find itself encased in Virgil's palm. Jobe blinked in disbelief the fact she'd caught his hand. He didn't get a chance to free it as he felt another clap down viciously on his shoulder.

"STOP IT!" Grace roared, sending his ears ringing. "What the hell's wrong with you? She just saved our lives and you're try to kill her?"

"Save our lives?" Jobe snapped sarcastically, glaring viciously at the woman over his shoulder. "This…" Jobe stopped, daring himself to say the word but hey, if she chose to crush his fist then it proved his case quite nicely. "…Freak's tried to kill me. Twice!"

Grace's eyes leapt from Jobe to Virgil and back again, brimming with confusion.

"I won't deny it but I swear I didn't mean to!" Virgil piped, only to get another sneer from Jobe.

"You didn't mean it? It sure didn't look that way to me when you trashed the van!"

Grace broke in again, frowning as she spoke.

"I thought you said I was the first person you met?"

"Yeah, sorry about that…to be honest, you're the fifth including those two down there, someone as equally crazy as them and this thing…" He jerked his head towards Virgil. "But then she's nothing more than another monster," He turned his gaze back to her. "Aren't you, Virgil?" The girl squirmed uncomfortably on the spot.

"Please Jobe, I'm sorry…I…" She trailed off, knowing no excuse would appease Jobe. There was an uncomfortable silence, broken yet again by Grace.

"Jobe, I don't know what the hell's happened between you two but you're being a royal shit. She saved us"

"Oh, so you're taking this freak's side now"

"Stop calling her THAT!"

Jobe snorted and Grace found herself starting to back away. Just catching the dark glint that sparked wildly in his eye made her shudder.

_'He's gone mad… completely mad'_

If Virgil had seen it, she would have recognised it instantly as the same one Jobe himself saw in Phil's decaying eyes and in her own before that unfortunate incident in the truck that had laid the seeds for this scene.

But those weren't the only time's this 'spark' had cropped up in Virgil's bizarre history…

8 8 8

She'd met Curtis Green in the bowls of this very hospital. When she'd first met him, it would have been hard to believe that the man had been a highly successful lawyer before he'd stumbled into the town of Silent Hill. If you were to look up 'nervous breakdown' in a medical dictionary, there would be a picture of him right next to the signs of symptoms. She'd managed to entice the quaking, stuttering heap of a man from the hospital back to the (relative) safety of the sewers and managed to keep him from going right over the edge for four whole days.

On the fifth, she'd lost him.

She'd been trying to get him to eat something other than the vitamin tablets he'd been slowly chewing, in a fashion that suggested he was teetering on the edge of catatonia, ever since she'd dragged him screaming from the hospital when he'd asked the question.

"Can you hear something?"

"Huh?" (The yet to be named) Virgil dropped the spoon she'd been holding, letting it rest inside the can she held as she strained her ears.

"It it sounds like voices…" Curtis trailed off, his already wrinkling brow furrowed with concentration. Virgil watched him wearily from underneath the peak of her hood as Curtis closed his eyes, the orbs visibly racing back and forth under the thin rolls of pink skin. "They're saying something…"

They snapped open and slowly, he turned his head to Virgil. She felt her throat cramp up when she saw the grin that was cracked across his face but the thing that really made her blood run cold were the eyes. There was something in them.

Something dark…

And in that instant, Virgil knew the town had finally hunted her down.

"They want to know why you've been keeping me here," Curtis rose to his full towering high and loomed down at the girl. "They want me…I see it now," He looked down at his hands as if liquid gold ran beneath his very skin. "I have my part to play, and so do you…but…" He stalled, squinting as if trying to understand some great truth. "…You…don't want too…"

By this point, Virgil's fingers had crept back to the spoon and clasped it so tightly that is smooth edge could slice them open easily. Curtis's eyes had fallen upon the upon a misplaced wrench that lay on the floor next to his foot. In a blink of an eye it was in his hand and he was slowly lumbering towards the girl, thick, dead laughter bubbling in his throat.

He'd lunged at her but somehow, the spoon had found its way into the lawyer's neck before he'd managed to land a blow, the flat, silver head rupturing skin and slashing his jugular vein open…

She'd dumped the body in one of the underground reservoirs, whatching as the body slowly sunk to the depths of the muddy, artificial lake of waste.

He'd become nothing more than yet another tool of the town…

8 8 8

"You don't believe me?"

Virgil was torn from the memory as Jobe whipped his encased fist back, reeling the unsuspecting girl with it and catching her in a chock hold, wrapping his free arm around her throat.

"Take a good look at this and tell me she's not another monster!"

"NOOO!" Virgil choked, her voice grating as Jobe's forearm clamped down on her neck like some iron bar, helpless to do anything as he viciously tore the hood back, grinning triumphantly.

For a moment, there was silence as Grace slowly lifted her hands to her mouth, her eyes wide with quite horror and repulsion but the message was loud enough for Virgil as the woman looked up and down her ruined face.

Grace had never seen anything like it in her life, trying to control the weird hybrid between pity and disgust that rose within her for the girl. It was as if her very features had been viciously scowered off, leaving nothing but cracked skin and scar tissue behind. All she could manage was a quiet "Oh my god…" as she tried not to stare; all the while the girl grimaced under her gaze as if it caused her some deep pain.

In truth, it did.

"See?" Jobe goaded, and that one word was all it took for something snapped in the girl he held captive. The roar burst from her mouth as she violently bucked forwards, sending the man tumbling over her bent back. He hit the floor with a crack as hot pain shot up his spine, gasping as the air gushed from his lungs.

Virgil rose up over the downed man, casting a low glance at Grace before pulling up the hood.

"He's right. I was just trying to help but maybe it would be for the best if I just…" She turned her back on the woman, who still stood slacked jawed, and took a step towards the door. "Oh, and I found this. You two might need it." She whispered heavily in her horribly cracked voice, tossing something over her shoulder. The small object flailed through the air before hitting the tiled floor with a soft jangle, sliding to a halt against the side of Grace's shoe. By the time the woman looked back to Virgil, the stooped girl had almost made it out the door.

"Wait!" She took a step after the shadow, subconsciously reaching towards her in some effort to appeal to her to stay. The girl stopped, casting a glace over her hunched shoulder. "Who are you?"

Virgil let out a lone choke of laughter and it made Grace want to plug her ears, so soulless was the sound.

"I'm just another monster."

And with that, she vanished back into the dark abyss that was Brook Haven Hospital.

"Oh man…" A voice behind the woman moaned and Grace turned on the man who was in the act of slowly propping himself up, rubbing his forehead. He felt as though someone had set a firework off inside his head, his temples thudding to a painfully precise beat that sent a fresh wave of dots dancing across his vision.

"What happened to it?"

Jobe seriously considered running like a mad man when he saw the look of sheer venom that set on Grace's face.

"It?" She hissed. "It left Jobe."

"Left?" Jobe's brows furrowed. "How could it, that thing was strapped to the bed."

"What?" The scowl momentarily melted, replaced by a look of utter confusion. Jobe reluctantly let the hand messaging his head momentarily leave its post and point at the bed, now almost completely dyed the deep, unmistakeable red tone of blood.

"Sloth…"

Grace was beginning to wonder if she was missing something.

"What the fuck are you on about? Virgo squared that thing!"

"Virgo?" Jobe jumped up in a flash, suddenly forgetting all about the vindictive headache. "You mean Virgil? She was here?"

Grace let out a shuddery laugh, not quite sure she was hearing the words tumbling from Jobe's mouth correctly.

_'This is unbelievable…'_

"Yeah, she was here. You watched her kick the crap outta that 'Sloth' before you TRIED TO KILL HER!" Grace found her voice rising uncontrollably; the gormless expression that adorned Jobe's face didn't help dampen the urge to slap him stupid. "That ring any bells?"

"What are you on a" Jobe stopped, something catching his words as an expression of sheer horror began to slowly gestate as the truth bulldozed into him. "Oh god…"

He fell quite, slowly shaking his head as if that could some how stop the memory of the last few minuets playing over and over like some skipping record in his head. Of course, it was no avail.

Somehow, he managed to muster the will power to look into Grace's eyes, even though he felt as though nothing would suite him more than crawling back under one of the beds and curling up in the darkness, with only that and his damning shame to keep him company. Grace wouldn't have protested.

"Where did she go?" The only answer he got from the woman was a grunt as she turned her back on him.

"What? You want to go finish the job?"

"Grace, I'm being serious!"

The woman turned on him, and in that single moment, Jobe truly did understand the phrase _'hell hath no fury than a woman scorned'_.

"So am I!" She bit back, sneering. "Jesus, I've never seen anyone go completely off the handle like that! What the hell were you thinking?!"

Jobe raised his hand in some feeble attempt to appeal to Grace, only the words never came and the hand dropped limply to his side. He hung his head.

"…I wasn't." He whispered, more to the floor than anyone else. It was true, but there was no way he could explain it to Grace without her thinking he was just trying to dig him self out of the hole he'd landed quite nicely in. The moment he'd opened his eyes and seen Virgil, It was as if every iota of malice and hate he'd even born against her consumed him. In the few minuets, nothing other than reducing the girl to a bloody mess would appease the overdose of rage that flooded his system. For a moment, it had been as if someone else had been at the controls…

_'This town, it does things to people…'_ the words echoed round his head, and the man began to wonder if he'd just suffered from the same disorder that had inspired Virgil to crash the van, and slice his hand open. God help him if it got to Grace before they managed to get out of here…

Jobe took a step towards the door, unconsciously causing the pain in his leg to flare, almost downing him.

"What are you doing?" Grace did nothing to help the man as he stumbled from the room, watching with cold eyes.

"I'm going to apologise, for all the good it'll do."

The man limped from the room, the sound of his limp foot squeaking against the floor slowly trailing away.

Alone, Grace bit her lip as she tried to work out just who's side everyone else was on, all of this was enough to make her spin. With a disgruntled sigh, she opened her fist, revealing Virgil's parting gift.

A set of car keys winked back at her from the palm of her hand.

8 8 8

_scccccch-chunk_

The sound of the butt of the shotgun's handle hitting the floor echoed lifelessly up the claustrophobic hallway as Jobe lumbered along it, retracing his steps to the entrance.

_Sccccch-chunk_

He winced at the pain as he dragged his foot but remained silent. He more than deserved it.

_Sccccch-chunk _

As much as he may have told himself he hated Virgil, he'd never actually wanted to hurt her, and the way he had was unfathomably malicious.

_Sccccch-chunk_

"Let me give you a hand, that noise is going to drive me mad."

Jobe craned his neck, only to see a shadowy Grace standing behind him, the fire axe tossed carelessly over her shoulder. He didn't protest as she slipped an arm around his shoulders and began to gently lead him down the hallway towards the weak light that poured through the open entrance.

8 8 8

Virgil lent heavily against the wall (almost a parody of Jobe's newfound walk) that lined the entrance walkway a little too hard. Deep down, she almost enjoyed the tingling sensation as the rough brickwork raked against her tattered skin and she was still dizzy from slamming her head against it. For reasons we could not begin to understand without a good comprehension of physiology, the girl had managed to convince her self that this masochistic punishment was more than necessary. Encoring Jobe's wrath like that was bad, and having disgusted that woman just by her physical appearance was even worse…

Once again, the town had proven to her that she was meant to be alone.

"Virgil!"

The girl stopped dead at the sound of her appointed name and turned.

Jobe and the woman had already started their messy decent down the flight of stone steps that lead to the hospital's entrance, their bodies moving to fast for their feet to keep up and for a moment, the girl feared the pair would trip as they staggered drunkenly towards her.

"Virgil," Jobe gasped again, breaking off from the poor woman whom he'd practically been draped over and stumbled towards the girl. "I know you probably won't even listen to this, and I don't blame you but I'm so sorry"

"P-please, don't"

The girl cut him off and even though Jobe had been expecting this, he felt crushed. He'd been desperately hoping that she'd at least hear him out.

"I understand, so there's no need, you see?" From the rush, shuddery way she said it, you would have thought she'd been the one to have the momentary slip of sanity.

Grace almost collapsed there and then. How could anyone possibly be so forgiving?

Jobe would have started gushing apologies there and then had not Virgil meekly continued.

"After all, it's not my place to judge you. I-if anything, I'm sorry for putting you in such a position."

This was all too much for Grace.

"Wait_, you're_ apologising to _him_?!"

Virgil turned to her and nodded slowly as she rasped.

"If you'd been hear for as long as I have, y-you'd see that this place has a habit in bringing out the worst in people"

As the last word crossed her lips, Jobe saw all the confidence that had fuelled her mild outspokenness burn out as she dropped her head, avoiding Grace's quizzical staring and collapse upon her self. He felt a quiet smile begin to form upon his face.

Something crossed Grace's face and she dug a hand into her pocket, pulling something from it and holding it out towards the girl.

"Hey, what's up with this key you gave me?"

Virgil allowed herself a short, nervous grin before jerking her head towards the road, nothing but a dark grey smear through the milky billows of fog. Despite that, even from where they stood, the large, solid shadow was almost visible.

Jobe took a shaky step towards it, coming so close to pinching himself to make sure that he wasn't asleep in some dank corner of the town as the (rather badly parked, the thing was practically at a right angle to the road) car slowly materialized out of the fog, revealing a little more of itself with every step he took.

Despite it looked as though the wheels could roll free at any moment and there was more rust than paint on its metallic outer shell, it was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

He turned to Virgil, grinning from ear to ear.

"Thank you…" He rushed as she handed him the key. She cringed at his words, as receiving complements had become an almost completely forging notion to her. Jobe turned his attention to Grace. "You still going to come, right?"

The woman scuffed her foot against the pavement thoughtfully. This guy had flipped from one extreme to the other fast enough to leave her wondering if he was some kind of schizophrenic, but the girl had managed to somehow forgive him, so why couldn't she. After all, he'd seemed like a pretty level guy before all that. Plus, how else was she going to get out of here other than through something unsavoury digestive system?

"What the hell," She sighed cynically; letting her self into the back of the once cream coloured automobile. "As long as you don't crash this one as well…"

Jobe slid himself into the driver's seat with a self-content smirk that quickly passed. It was scary how much everything had changed in the last few hours…

He made to put the key in the ignition but the sound of a third door being slammed shut staved his hand. Jobe glanced up in the mirror, only to see Virgil staring blankly up at him from the back seat, instantly shifting when she caught the man's eye's in the glass's dusty surface as if he'd caught her with a hand in the metaphorical cookie jar.

"If you don't want me to come, then just say…"

"No. Please, stay."

Virgil froze.

"Y-you really mean that?" She choked out the words in dumb disbelief.

"Of course, I owe you more than that."

A gloomy silence fell over the car as it pulled away from the hospitals entrance, melting effortlessly into the fog. Soon, even the sound of the car's engine faded away into the mist and the town resumed its cold silence. Yet, for those who could stretch their ears to hear the sound would be able to tell there was something content in it and those who could see would know it was smiling,

For the town knew it hadn't seen the last of them…

8 8 8

A/N: The first part of this chapter was written to 'Linkin Park's Breaking the Habit and…well, despite the amount of people who hate that groupe, it kinda goes. Next chapter, we'll be learining a little more about who Virgil is, though I fear most of you have probably worked it out…


	34. The not so tragic death of a monster: Th...

I'll just let you know, this chapter contains some not so pretty language and scenes.

The not so tragic death of a monster: The fourth interlude

Part 1: Revelations of now…

Virgil let her head slump against the cool surface of the window, allowing it to vibrate softly against the glass as the car jolted against the un-kept tarmac of the road, whatching blankly as the town sped past. The shadowy buildings beyond the stained plane of glass would occasionally shift into a momentary focus, but almost as soon as they had, the details melted back into the grey mist they'd been spawned from as the car sped by.

Why on earth had she agreed to come?

The question rolled about the inside her head, stubbornly demanding to be supplied with an answer with a voice like that of a spoilt child. Whatever doubtful part of her brain sprung it upon her wasn't going to let it drop until it ether got what it wanted or drove her mad with its tireless nagging.

'You belong here…' 

Well, as far as Virgil was concerned, not any more. To tell the god honest truth, she'd had enough of that place and its demons and secrets. Right at that very moment, she didn't care if she woke up tomorrow back in her own pathetic excuse for a bed in that dank little hole she called home if she could only just pretend for a few moments that she was free…

The others certainly seemed to believe that they were. As Virgil looked around the car, she began to feel as though the heavy cloud of foreboding that hovered above her head seemed to be raining only on her. Next to her, Grace was humming a springy little melody to her self, tapping out an uncoordinated beat that never seemed to fit the tune on the faded wooden panels below the window. Jobe seemed to be in a far more sombre state, grunting occasionally as he applied that little extra bit of pressure to the accelerator but that was the only thing damping his mood.

With a sigh, Virgil turned back to whatching Silent Hill sweep by…

Optimists always ended up getting hurt the most.

"Grace," Jobe's voice floated into the back, "How do you know Casper?"

The humming stopped as if someone had hit the mute button on the woman and Virgil silently observed how her fingers instantly froze.

"Casper Bates? The guy in the hospital?" She asked in a distant voice, suddenly becoming completely absorbed by something beyond the car window.

Jobe grunted in confirmation, tensely whatching the woman through the rear-view mirror as she shifted in her seat, a thick wrinkle taking over her brow.

"I don't really…He I" The words tripped off her tong. She swallowed a dry mouthful and tried again. "I did…some work for him, nothing big or anything…"

Jobe remained silent, even if it was killing him not blurt out how painfully obvious it was that Grace wasn't telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help her god…

"Any way, out of the blue, this guy, Casper, shows up on my door step screaming that I'm going to play some huge part in the coming of god because of my sin's or some shit like that and jumps me. Next thing I know, I'm tied up in the back of a van he's driving and we're in the middle of nowhere."

From the way her words had suddenly begun to spill so effortlessly, Jobe didn't doubt the authenticity of this part even if the first time he'd met the man he'd written him off as completely harmless, if not a little eccentric…

"But then the van ran out of gas or something…Anyway, we stopped and he comes into the back to get another can but I managed to hit him one and made a run for it into the woods."

"Then what happened?"

"II don't know… I got back on to the main road and…" She stuttered to a halt, frowning as her mouth tried to form words that seemed to be desperately clinging to her tongue. "I guess I must have past out or something, cos next thing I know, I'm in that town and the whole place is deserted."

Jobe kept his eyes on the road ahead but his mind was a million miles away as he mulled over the compound of thoughts swirling about inside his head. Trying to pick the questions apart only lead to new one's taking their place.

For a while, awkward silence reigned supreme over the car. Looking at the grey world outside, Jobe felt a wave of relief wash over him when he saw that the neglected, ramshackle buildings had given way to a forest of faceless pine trees.

They'd made it out…

Yet still something chewed away relentlessly at the back of Jobe's mind and Eddie's words came floating back to him, whispering cruelly in his ear in a taunting voice.

'I've got sin, hell, we've all got it…' 

But Jobe couldn't think of anything he'd done that had earned him a place along murderers and worse. Sure, he may have told one or two lies and lost his rag a couple of times but nothing that quite warranted as 'sinning'.

And Grace? Well she seemed to have been dragged into all this by some nutcase who believed that she was going to play some vital role in rising 'God'. Looking at her, the last thing you'd think she could be was a herald of a new Messiah…

So what about Virgil?

In the front, Jobe wetted his lips, trying to work out how to post the question with out her flipping out completely and stabbing him through the back of the seat. After all, in all the short time he'd known her any topics concerning her and her background were strictly taboo.

"Virgil?"

Jobe wished he could grab the words and drag them back down inside. Now he really was going to have to ask…

The girl looked up from the window.

"Someone I met in Silent Hill told me that…well, it draws a certain kind of person to it. Do you have you…"

"You want to know what I did." With that one, flat sentence, she'd saved the floundering Jobe, but the moment he'd heard her sour words, he suddenly realised that perhaps this was another door that was built to stay firmly locked.

Virgil returned to gazing out of the window, her mind already whirling back to the events of two years gone that she'd promised her self she'd never EVER make her self relive again. Oh well, it was too late for that now, she'd opened the floodgate and was powerless to stop the flow of words that came such a painful ease.

Part 2: And revelations of then…

The girl looked up at the house, glowering at the building with such venom that you'd think she'd pull a 'Carrie White' and blow it up just by wishing that little bit harder. After all, it had been no more a home than a prison to the girl form her earliest memory of when the marginally good times (though reflecting back on them now, they were like some wondrous golden age…) had turned oh so bitter…

But then the girl smiled; reminding herself that this was no time for reminiscing. After all, this dreary, overcast Thursday afternoon was going to be her day of liberation from the insignificant, semi-detached ruin that was effortlessly shamed by its near immaculate neighbours. She was finally going to escape, and there was no way she was going to be coming back. Not this time, even if _he_ hunted her down again and tried to drag her back like the last time…

For it was not the house itself that scared the girl, waking her up at night in a cold sweat as her eyes raced around her room, rabidly checking that none of the shadows were concealing something that shouldn't be... It was the beast within.

You see, there was something terrible that lived inside this house, a vindictive creature that failed tragically to pass itself off as a man. It went from day to day wallowing in an ever-darkening hole of self-pity, lashing out at those around it with words laced with alcoholic fumes. Anyone who even deigned to even look at it the wrong way would not be spared from a torrent of violent, verbal abuse. But behind closed doors and out of sight from the rest of the world, this monster was capable of doing far worse things…

The girl shook her head, cutting short her mind's wondering and scolded herself for wasting so much precious time. When it finally staggered home from the bar at some ungodly hour and found her gone…well, she wanted to be as far from her hometown of Brahms as possible.

Angela Orosco refreshed her the tired, worn smile and went to unlock the door, for after tonight, she was never going to let her father torment her ever again, be it physically or mentally.

No matter how many times she told herself that, not once did it ring true.

8 8 8

The girl passed through the tiny kitchen, dragging a small suitcase that was fit to burst behind her. In the space of three minuets, the girl had rooted through her sparse belonging, picking out anything that could hopefully be pawned off for more than five dollars, or enough to scrape together enough cash for a ticket on the first greyhound coach out of here…

Oh yes, this time she was going to do everything properly and by the time her father got home, she'd be long gone.

Out of the corner of her eye, Angela caught sight of the clock that hung over the kitchen door before she paced through out through it into the hallway. The shortest hand lingered indecisively between five and six, slowly dithering towards the latter at such a slow speed that you wouldn't have missed anything if you looked back five minuets later.

Angela stopped. Even on a good day (i.e., one where her father arrived at his damned drinking hole, only to realise that he'd squandered almost all his money there the night before) he wouldn't manage to make it back before seven, at least.

The girl dropped the suitcase on the wooden table, no longer noticing nor caring how many circular stains tattooed its surface and turned to the kitchen surface. She'd also stopped seeing how the occasional bottle of alcohol had managed to settle down in between the kitchen appliances like nested vermin as she searched for a clean glass. This in itself was a surprisingly hard task, seeing as her father had a wonderful habit of reducing them to shattered, translucent shards.

_'To freedom…'_ The girl poured out some water and lifted the glass in a private toast-

"What the fuck's all this?"

The glass slipped from her hand, cracking into countless pieces as it hit the inexpensive lino floor.

"shit…" She hissed to herself, trying to stop her heart from burst through her chest as she lent against the work surface with a shaking hand.

She looked over her shoulder, and sure enough, there stood the owner of the voice in all his glory, leaning against the opposite doorframe.

_The beast…_

_The monster…_

_Her tormentor…_

_Her father…_

"II didn't know you were home…" Angela muttered numbly, any of the optimism in her wilting away like a dying plant.

"What else to I do on a Thursday afternoon?" He snarled in a patronising voice, pulling his lip back in a bestial sneer.

Shit! How could she have been so stupid? Her father didn't have to go down to the logging factory on Thursdays ever since he'd received that recent promotion to overlooking wood treatment.

"What is that?" He nodded his head towards the suitcase that lay guiltily upon the table. "You think you're going to leave me?" His heavy work boots clumped dully as he slowly began to walk towards her, the lip twitching as if caught in a wild dance.

The girl tired to shrink back but the hard cabinet offered no shelter.

"I-I-I'm s-s-sorry but I just can't take this any more, please…can't"

His balled fist slammed into the table, rocking the sturdy wooden structure, the sharp smack of flesh slicing through her stammering.

"AGAIN?!" He roared, the colour flaring in his face, still visible through his scruffy, one-day beard. He looked up at his daughter, stopping her breath dead when she caught the look in his blood-shot eyes. "So you think you can just get up and leave me too, huh?" He hissed, the tips of his knuckles turning bone white as his fist trembled against the wood. "Just like that pussy-bitch of a wife and son of mine…"

He wavered, his wrath drenched momentarily as he wallowed in memories. Even from the other side of the kitchen, Angela could smell the intoxicating stench of stale whisky on his breath and quaked. Drink always brought out the worst in him…

Thomas Orosco snapped his frayed attention back onto his daughter, the anger that coursed through his veins fully re-fuelled.

"What is it that I do? I loved them…I love you too, but then you all just leave me…" Something began to well up in the corner of his swimming eyes. "Don't you know how much this hurts me? Do you think I _want_ to be alone?" The words came out as nothing but a low moan, setting hairs Angela didn't even know she had on edge. Tears were an even worse omen of things to come, and every time these heated conversations flared up between them like this…well, we will see the road they usually took for our selves.

His teeth began to grind dangerously together as the girl remained silent, drooping her head and trying to hind behind the curtain of black hair that fell across her face.

"BITCH!" The roar came like a thunderclap and for a brief moment, Angela wondered how she'd come to be sprawled out on the kitchen floor. That was until she saw her father towering over her, the tips of his balled knuckles flushed red as they violently tremored. It perfectly went hand in hand with her stinging cheek, drawing her to the obvious conclusion.

"What is it? I take care of you…isn't that good enough?"

No answer came the loud reply.

"Don't you love me?" Yet again, all the anger had melted away, defusing through his skin and dissolving into the ether as he mewed piteously.

Angela let the blood roll over her tongue as if it were some fine wine and turned her head away, coming face to face with the dust that had collected under the skirting boards. Anything was better than looking at him when he was like _this_. Some deep shame burned inside her at the thought that it was this man, who at times could be so unbelievably fragile and powerless, keeping her here like some prisoner. Truth be told, she preferred it when he ranted like some bated creature and destroyed anything he could get his savage hands on (even if it was Angela herself), because if she submitted to this pathetic drunkard before her and let it control her life, how _weak_ did it make _her_?

The clock ticked tirelessly on, the quite sound dominating the small room until Thomas let out a choke of barren laughter. The hawked noise was so mirthless and cruel that the girl wanted to do nothing more than rip her ears from her head, if only it would make it stop. Instead, she lay there, motionless save for the growing cringe that spread across her face as his dry cackle slowly grew louder until it filled every dirty inch of space within the kitchen.

"So what?" He snorted darkly, the mirth slowly ebbing off like cheap booze. "Now you think you're better than me?"

Silence…

Something snapped in Mr. Orosco, His swimming, drugged brain no longer able to tolerate the unforgiving blanking it was receiving from his daughter. Who the hell was she to judge him after _all_ he'd given her? That ungrateful little cunt, he'd show her how much she needed him…how much she really did love him.

Mumbling something along those lines on numbed lips, the man descended upon his daughter, catching her in his long fingers that instantly began to explore and ravage anything they touched. The girl screamed even though she knew all to well that no one would hear, let alone listen, but that didn't stop her cry for help. Like some doomed Cassandra, she saw what was going to befall her, but as always, was powerless to stop it…

"Shut the fuck up!" He roared in her face, frothed spittle gathering at the corners of his mouth, but she screamed again, slapping her palm into his face in a weak attempt to hold him back. He retaliated with his own hand, rolling it into crude bludgeon and laid into her. He didn't even bother to try holding back.

The girl felt the world slip out of focus around her, the find details that defined the kitchen blurring together in a hectic mess of colour. Angela was barely away of her father's fingers as they greedily migrated down her body, to busy trying to persuade her mind that it to should give way to the sweet unconsciousness that beckoned to her. At least that way, she wouldn't have to be here when he…he…

She let go of this world, slipping into the quagmire of memories, one after another filed away in her mind. It would be a lie to say that they were any less disturbing than her current situation…

8 8 8

It would not be total fiction if you were told before Mrs. Orosco left, she and her husband did manage to salvage the occasional tender moment from their self-destructive relationship. Things usually followed a persific pattern…she would say something that Thomas would interpret as a smear on his character and accused her of nagging. She'd retaliated by offering him a piece of her mind (i.e., some less than constructive criticism) and things generally went downhill from there…

After blows had been exchanged, he would apologize to the train-wreck of a woman he'd reduce his wife to and things were usually resolved with a physical gesture of love. Everything would go back to being hunky-dory for a blessed short while until the vicious cycle re-started itself again…

When Angela was at the grand old age of ten, her mother finally decided she'd had enough and packed her bags. Needless to say, her father didn't take it to well and the pair had exploded into an apocalyptic argument, even by their standards. Angela and her younger brother had exchanged wide-eyed glances as they cowered in the relative safety of her room, trying not to listen to the pair of hateful, shrieking voices that carried through the house. At any moment, they had expected to hear the tail-tell thud of a body hitting the floor.

Fortunately, Mrs. Orosco managed to escape unscathed, narrowly dodging the suitcase that was flung vehemently after her by her husband. He was still screaming profanities as she drove away from it all and didn't stop until he noticed that the majority of his neighbours were staring at him from their porches or between the gaps in their curtains, all wearing the same look of dumb shock.

That day, the two children saw something die in their father; he went for days without leaving the house, floating aimlessly from room to room, all the while heartlessly ranting about how wrong this all was. Over time, he began to convince himself that the whole world had turned its back on him, forsaking him to lonely solitude. Occasionally he would become romantically involved with some other women but there was never any substance to these short relationships. Ultimately, they would end with a painless break up and Thomas would sink ever deeper into the black, melancholy pool of his own world. And that was where he met someone wonderful, someone who could sooth all his pain and never persecute him for his faults.

Alcohol.

For days on end he would drink as he fell deeper and deeper into this destructive love affair, becoming totally oblivious to the world around him as he shut him self off from it. By some miracle, he managed to keep his job down at the logging factory, probably only because his co-workers pitied him and 'the children'.

Angela had been all alone in the house with him on that Saturday morning when _it _began. Her father had just gone through yet another extremely turbulent break up with some floozy half his age and by this point, his two offspring had lost all sympathy for him. So Thomas Orosco turned to the bottle, the one and only companion who stood by him through the thick and thin of the self-imposed tradagy that had become his life.

She'd been whatching him from the other end of the kitchen, under the guise of doing homework which her mind wasn't focused on anyway. Every now and again, the child peeked over the top of the sheet she was supposedly reading at the man slumped over the table, dead to the world.

She quickly looked away as he stirred, listening as he groaned heavily and sat up with a painful slowness.

"Come 'ere" He blinked at the child with dull, bloodshot eyes that reflected nothing. The quickly clouded over when he saw her poorly masked apprehension as Angela fidgeted in her seat, trying to prolong going near him for as long as possible.

After an extremely short and one sided battle of wills, the girl caved and slunk over to her brooding father and very reluctantly accepted the place on his lap he offered. It wasn't that she hated the man; rather she hated being anywhere in the proximity of him after a night's drinking. As said before, it had a tendency to bring out the worst in him, even in the early days of his affair with the magical elixir.

"You don't hate me, do you?" Angela felt something bitter rise in her throat when she heard how genially scared he sounded as he whispered the question in her ear.

"No"

"Good…" She felt his hand move, surreptitiously shifting up her thigh. "That's good," He purred again, the hand softly rubbing against her upper leg. "Now, promise me you'll never leave…"

"I-I've got to work…" She hopped from her father's lap and raced out from the kitchen before he had a chance to see her burning face, trying not to vomit there and then from the myriad of feeling that flushed through her.

That night, she didn't hesitate to lock the door to her room.

Gradually, over the years, Mr. Orosco grew bolder on these approaches on his daughter…after all, she must like it, as she never once voiced objection when he 'touched' her and for a short while, Thomas was happy. He'd finally found someone he could show his affection to and not be turned down and for a while, things were good for him…until he began asking questions.

Why didn't she return his love? Why didn't she ever once respond to his affection? Perhaps she didn't love him after all…

Paranoia and fear took root and they were very quickly justified.

He'd cornered his now sixteen year-old daughter one day when they were alone together and asked if she still felt for him. Something inside the girl finally snapped and all the years of abuse that had eaten her hollow from the inside out found a voice. Needles to say, it wasn't one he wanted to hear.

He'd beaten her and finally fucked, yes, as sad as it is, that is the only word that can possible describe what he did to her.

He'd shown her, and he would again and again until it drove his son to leave in disgust but apart from that (and crushing ay renaments of a soul his daughter once possessed in to dust) there were no negative repercussions.

Until now…

8 8 8

'Crack' 

Angela felt something explode in the front of her skull, agonisingly ripping her from the world of times gone by.

Having had his way with her limp body, a mixture of lust and self-loathing overtook him so, naturally, he took it out on his daughter and yanked her up by the hair before smashing her head into unforgiving work surface. With a snarl, he grabbed a half empty bottle of 'Southern Comfort' and stormed from the room and left his till trembling daughter to sort herself out.

The girl didn't dare to move until the sound of her father's footfall had slipped into the next room, finally daring to look up only when she was sure he was gone, blinking furiously as she forced her eyes to re-focus.

The first thing that took form before her was the knife block, complete with the trademark smooth black handles of these particularly sharp kitchen appliances.

'Take one…' 

With slow caution, the girl reached out, wrapping her hand around the plastic hilt as she numbly followed the voice's instruction.

_'Why?'_

_'Don't be so naive, you know what we have to do!'_

She dropped the knife as she drew it from the wooden block, bile rising in her throat with the coming of the revelation.

_'But, I can't …'_

'DO IT!' 

The soundless voice rung in her ears as she grabbed the sharp blade and walked with a deliberate slowness into the lounge.

Perhaps if Mr. Orosco hadn't been whatching T.V as he silently stewed, he would have heard his daughter creeping up behind him and may have turned in time to see the knife's steel blade dance in the dim light as her hand shook.

But he didn't, and was still wondrously oblivious to her existence as she came to rest behind the armchair he'd folded into for the evening. However, when the knife came slamming down into his shoulder, severing muscle and tendons, he finally took notice…

With a squawked yell, he leapt up from the chair, the knife still buried deep within him. White, hot agony seared through him as she pulled the knife free, whatching without pity as Thomas turned round and for the first time, saw the face of his assailant.

The look on his face was priceless, but the expression of dark horror and shock rapidly gave way as the knife shot out again, this time finding his throat. Effortlessly, it ripped through his tender skin and he hit the floor, choking wetly as he helplessly watched his own blood gush forth and soak into the cheap carpet.

She watched as her father writhed against the floor, his wide, panic-stricken eyes silently praying for help as he struggled to get up.

_'Look at how weak he is…end it, end it all.'_

The suppressed wrath within the girl finally consumed her and she descended upon the man, the blade finding his neck again and again and again, ribbons of crimson streaming from the mess she reduced it to.

Finally, she rolled off him, panting as the buzz of adrenalin slowly died down.

A full moment later, the true magnitude of what she'd just done hit home with a sickening clarity.

"Oh my god…" She whispered to her self, and for the first time saw the stark, red blood that had seeped into the cuffs of her jumper and ran down the cracks of her hands.

Angela felt her stomach turned to water as she huddled into the nearest corner, trying desperately to not look at the still warm corpse of her father and all the while, desperately wracking her brain for someway to get out of this situation.

She had to get out of here…

The girl burst from the house as dusk gave way to night, still gripping the knife so tightly that she'd all but lost the feeling in that hand.

If only there was someone she could turn to…

'Where was it mamma said she'd gone?' 

Silent Hill, the voice within smoothly answered and without hesitation, the girl took off into the gathering darkness.

8 8 8

Virgil's voice cracked on the last syllable, her worn voice finally breaking down in to tears. Jobe could only look ahead as he let her harrowing tail sink in and silently wished he'd never even thought of asking. In the back, Grace stared at the girl numbly, the cigarette she'd gone to smoke as Virgil had began to talk clung unlit to her lip.

"You asked me what my name was and now you know," Virgil grabbed her head in her hands, her slumped back violently shaking as she spoke. "But I don't want to be her anymore…" Her words disintegrated into wracked sobs. Grace, not knowing any better consolation for what she'd just heard, tenderly wrapped an arm around the girl, who just cried all the harder.

A/N- certain parts of that chapter was extremely hard to write as I'm so frigid, I can't even write scenes of a sexual nature without clamming up but I hope it's better than the last one. I realise that it's extremely long and I probably start waffling uneccerceraly somewhere around the middle but one thing led to another.

Please don't flay me for this…


	35. Some society

Well, with that unpleasantness behind us, let us move on. The end is drawing ever near, me thinks this will be done and dusted in five chapters, give or take (most likely give though). A huge thank you to everyone whose reviewed.

Chapter 30: Some Society…

Roy Mark's surveyed the interior of his roadside dinner and sighed. His wife had been right, this had been a stupid venture and any fool could see that the risk desperately overbalanced the slim chance of it paying off. But did he listen? Of course not, he was too busy being a stubborn, headstrong, old bastard to listen to any of her words of warning.

Well, he'd had all the time in the world to morn this decision; barely a single soul had come in here since he'd opened up three months ago and already, his bank balance was swan diving towards the red…

Roy, looking desperately for a distraction from the galling job of accepting failure, briefly checked his watch and raised an eyebrow. Ten o' four? Jeeze, time was really spreading itself thin this night.

_'Screw the open twenty-four hour guarantee…'_

The somewhat podgy man went to turn of the neon sign (that alone was costing him an arm and a leg to keep on) that proudly proclaimed this fact to the empty highway but stopped, his callous finger hovering indecisively over the switch.

The long absent sound of gravel crunching beneath slowing tires reached his ears.

Roy peered out of the large window that occupied the front of the shop, uncertain that his brain hadn't finally given under the mind numbing boredom of running a failing briskness. Sure enough, a beaten up rust-bucket of a car was pulling up outside the dinner. Roy blinked and almost had the long expected cardiac arrest that his doctor had warned him about there and then when he saw the car was still there AND was actually stopping in the parking lot.

Grinning, the man returned to his post behind the counter; it looked like karma had finally decided to smile down on him, cut him some slack and bring him some long absent customers.

But the grin that he'd worn so gleefully on his face instantly collapsed upon itself when he saw the state of the three figures that trudged out of the car and begun slowly meandering towards the restaurant as if they were blindly following the light emitting from it like a pack of moths.

Roy Mark's sighed loudly as the bell above the door jangled into life, shaking the gathering dust free from within the tiny copper dome. The point of no return had been breached and there was no way he could avoid these youths, even if he could afford it.

_'Karma's a bitch'_

8 8 8

Jobe tried his hardest to pull a painful smile as he approached the counter, pretending he couldn't see the look of disgust and shock stapled on the owner's slack-jawed face. The three of them must look as though they'd just clambered out of a sewer (which for two of them was actually true).

"Why don't you two go sit down?" Jobe firmly asked from the corner of his mouth, no more a query than a rigid instruction. With out question Grace peeled off and led Virgil, who ever since that particularly disturbing revelation had slipped back into a state of dumb catatonia, towards the horde of spotless tables. The white-haired proprietor watched them from underneath knitted brows with a gaze that reeked of suspicion. Jobe wondered if this man thought they were going to try and take off with the cutlery or, shock horror, steal the napkin dispenser.

"What can I do you for?" He breathed, and his seemingly tolerant words could easily be translated into something along the lines of 'I've got a twelve gauge sitting under this here counter and I'm just looking for you to give me an excuse to use it.'

"You still serving food?"

The man scratched the back of his head with a deliberate thoughtfulness.

"Well, I got some sandwiched but if you're hankering for something hot, it'll take me a while to fire up the fryer." Translation-'I don't want you and your freak show in here for a moment longer than it takes to get this transaction done and dusted.'

"That'll be fine…"

But Roy had disappeared into the storeroom before Jobe had even finished speaking.

"Jobe?" The man started as a voice that seemed to have materialized from nowhere accosted him from behind. He turned to see an extremely tired looking Grace offering her best attempt of a friendly smile. It failed pathetically to mask whatever morbid concern was silently nagging her.

"What's wrong?"

Grace dropped her head, laughing a laugh that was void of passion.

"You saw right through that, huh? No dancing around a point with you…" She looked up, the haggard smile looking all the more pained.

"'Fraid not. Something bothering you, isn't it?" Jobe whished she'd stop procrastinating and quit taunting him with her unsaid thought.

"It's just…" She turned, leaning her back into the wooden counter. "What are we going to do with Virgil?"

Jobe turned to Grace, but her eyes managed to dance out of the way whenever he tried to meet them with his own.

"What do you mean?" He asked in a low voice, examining the small proportion of her face that wasn't turned from him out of the corner of his eye. Grace took her time carefully choosing the right words, after all, the last thing they needed was a scene with Roy looking for the first opportunity to call the highway patrol.

"Well, we can't exactly take her back to wherever she came from after what she did, and letting her lose into society doesn't strike me as being too hot an idea either. It'd be like sticking a piranha in a bowl filled with gold fish…"

"You sure it wouldn't be the other way around?" Jobe intervened, his eyes lingering on the girl in question as she sat motionless, lost in a world of her own.

Grace grunted curtly in response and the man began to wonder if her parents were feeling particularly witty when choosing her painfully ironic name.

8 8 8

This predicament still remained unresolved by the time Jobe was halfway the over-priced sandwich that Roy had grudgingly handed over, bitterly shocked to see that this dirty, ragged man actually had the money to pay for it.

Roy glowered at them from the sanctuary of the counter, pretending to clean an already immaculate plate as he silently watched them, wanting nothing more than to see their backs. Sure, they hadn't actually done anything (apart from looking extremely worse for wear) to justify the deep feeling of dread, lying curled up in the depths of his stomach with a purr that intensified each time he looked at them. As stupid as it sounded, He felt as though he was in the presence of ghosts, each one hiding something o so very dark beneath their transparent skin. But Roy, with his mortal eyes, could only get a faint outline of whatever it was that haunted this trio so.

And that girl, the one with the hood, she was the worst.

Good fortune, who had forsaken both parties for such a long time decided it was time to let its precens be know and resolve both problems, announcing its arrival as all rare patrons of this diner did. Eight sets of eyes snapped up as the bell above the door sang out for the second time that night and the reactions from Grace and Roy were polar opposites as the two police officers stepped into the restaurant, surveying their sudden, dead silent surroundings.

While the elderly man practically pulled every muscle in his face as it exploded into a smile of relief, Grace caught Jobe's eye and saw he was closer to her own train of though. This wasn't a good progression, after all, in that rust-bucket of a car that had got them out of Silent Hill was a whole menagerie of weapons. Even she, an imaginative liar at the best of times could not think of one plausible excuse to explain their origins. After all, who'd ever heard of someone taking a fire axe on a hunting expedition?

"My god, so quiet in here, you'd think someone had gone and died!" The older of the two proclaimed, his already lined face creasing further as he grinned at the sparse occupants.

None laughed.

His partner, even though relatively new to the world of law enforcement, noticed how the only group of customers all dropped their curios gaze like they were afraid of being caught staring when he looked at them, setting the little, whispering voice of suspicion nagging in his ear. He didn't let them out of his sight, even as his partner ordered a pot of coffee strong enough to wake a coma victim and exchanged a far warmer conversation with Roy than Jobe had had the pleasure of.

"Quiet out here tonight, huh? The elder and less observant of the two drawled from a mouth that looked as though it was happiest chewing up tobacco before spitting the cud-like mess into a spittoon and hearing that satisfying 'ping'.

"Mhumm," Roy wordlessly commented. "This is the busiest I've been in months…"

The other cop lent forward over the wooden counter, catching Roy's eyes above the rim of his opaque sunglasses, fixing it instantly.

"If that's so, then why'd you look so glum 'bout those guys?" From the low way he talked, it was clear that this particular soul's mouth wasn't made for munching leaves. Roy dropped the act, bending down low over the counter as he whispered, confessing everyone of his fears.

"There's something…I don't know…outta place. Don't they strike you as a little weird? To be honest, I want them out of here fast."

The younger cop nodded slowly, but despite his somewhat fearsome skills of observation and character judgment, he failed to see the sneer growing on his superior's face, like a dog who's position of leader of the pack has been usurped.

8 8 8

"Shit…"

Jobe looked up from the sandwich at Grace, who had gone stiffer than a pole.

"What?"

"They're coming over here!"

He looked up, and sure enough, the two men in their beige uniforms were slowly sauntering towards them.

"What are"

"Just improvise…" And already, Grace had put on a rather charming smile that Jobe found rather hard to swallow after listening to her attempt to cover up whatever truth it was she was hiding from him. But hey, he wasn't going to complain if it helped get them out of the rapidly approaching mess that was currently sitting down at the next table.

"Boy, you folks sure are close to nowhere!" The older started in a friendly enough voice that begged for conversation, his partner smiling just that little bit too hard.

Grace laughed.

"Ha, you could say that again. We've been driving for hours and this is the closet thing to civilisation we've seen in a long time…"

So Jobe left the budding conversation in the all too capable hands of Grace as she and the elder cop yammered on about nothing of importance. The fear of suspicion would have all but left him if it hadn't been for the talkative cop's younger counter-part. He said nothing, and Jobe couldn't tell what he was staring at behind those mirrored glasses but he would gladly wager that the stony cop hadn't blinked for all the time he'd sat down. He shifted uncomfortably, feigning interest in the ongoing dialogue but there was something else that nagged at the back of his mind that kept him from hearing the words. Every now and again, he would feel the girl next to him shiver as if intoxicated with cold, her shallow breathing growing all the more rapid.

'She's going to lose it…' 

The thought suddenly dawned on Jobe with sickening clarity and silently prayed that none else would notice how she shook with growing intensity, but, alas, the good fortune that had put the necessary components for this scene into motion had chosen its side.

"Is your friend feeling alright?" The young cop asked, his light brows furrowing ever so slightly.

"Uh, yeah…she just…has flu." The speed of that sentence must have fluxed at least four times and Jobe caught Grace shooting him a disapproving scowl. "I think I'm going to take her out to get some air…"

The man finished his horribly gushed and forced stament and jumped to his feet, the girl slowly mirroring his action.

"What the"

'CRUNCH'

And that was when everything went to shit.

Let us pause for a moment and look back at what happened all in the time for Grace to blink. In that short moment between two seconds, the elder cop had caught sight of Virgil's hands as she pushed her self up from the table and made the fatal error of reaching out to the twisted appendage in innocent curiosity. Unfortunately for him, Virgil didn't interpret it this way, rather as an action fuled by hungry aggression and reacted as any person who had spent the last two years of their life relying on brute grit to survive would.

The elderly cop, a mister Polasiky, was given a brief moment to examine the object of his attention as it slammed into his face, grinding his teeth and flesh together.

"NO!" Jobe barked, but it was too little, too late and he was helpless to watch as the whole ugly scene unfolded before him.

The girl barged past him, but the younger cop was already up on his feet (sadly, the same couldn't be said of his superior, who lay incapacitated on the floor and cupping his blood-stained hands over a mouth that was bubbling with the stuff), a can of mace that seemed to have come from nowhere gripped tightly in his hand.

"FREEZE!" He'd already predicted Virgil's obvious escape route, sliding out in front of her as she ran headlong towards the door, the can primed.

Even if the girl wanted to stop, the frictionless floor and her built up momentum were both against that plan of action and ploughed straight towards him.

Grace winced in preparation of the immanent collision…but the young cop had other plans, pressing down on the little red button and emptying as much of the can's misty spray into the atmosphere. He dove out of the way as Virgil tripped past, howling as her eyes exploded with a sensation, as if someone had just rammed two lit matches into them, but that wasn't the end of the sudden pain. The fiery liquid seeped into her skin and the already raw and torn organ began to scream along with her as she staggered to a halt, clawing at her face as if she could dig out the pain. The only thing she succeeded at clawing out was her own flesh.

The cop surveyed his handy work with a silent, sadistic pleasure, pulling the nightstick from his belt and slowly approached the writhing girl.

She turned, looking up blindly at the sound of on-coming foot fall, rabidly looking for something to lash out at.

But the footsteps stopped.

The fair-haired cop stood motionless his face twisted with and expression of failed comprehension, trying to work out if his eyes weren't just showing him some fabrication of his mind. The…supposed girl before him snarled back from under a mask of charred skin, tainted red with blood.

"Holy"

He stopped as the pair of streaming eyes locked on to him, narrowing into thin, white slits. Had Virgil been given the chance to launch herself at the unfortunate cop, well, it wouldn't be worth thinking about but she never got the chance.

Polasiky had long since pushed himself up from the floor, still dribbling blood that slipped out from between the new gap in his teeth.

Virgil never saw the blow coming as the old cop sidled up next to her, nightstick a swinging. The leather baton smacked into the side of her head, sending her sprawling on the floor and Polasiky didn't waste time descending on her, a pair of handcuffs clutched tightly in his hand.

8 8 8

She was still thrashing when the younger cop threw her into the back of the squad car, slamming the door quickly behind her.

"Where the hell did you pick up this god damn animal anyway?" He turned on the man and woman who stood several feet off.

"Silent Hill, she was hitch-hiking and, well, we though we should the Christian thing. I had no idea she was so…" Jobe couldn't listen to the silver-tongued woman next to him anymore for fear of being sick. How could she just lie like this? Was she going to damn the one (questionably) good thing that had from that town to the mercy of the judicial force.

_'I don't see you doing anything, either, hero.'_ The small voice that resided with in his head whispered and the shame came crashing down on him. It was right, he wasn't going to stick his neck out to save her either, no matter how much he wanted to pass judgement on Grace to ease his own conscience.

"What's her name, anyway?" The nameless cop asked as he pushed his glasses up the smooth ridge of his nose.

"Angela Orosco" Grace hadn't meant for the name to roll off her tongue so effortlessly, but the speed at which she'd been spurting non-truths just dragged it out.

_'Whoops…'_

Grace licked her lips and forced a smile, hoping neither of them would recognise the name but her hope all but disintegrated when she saw that the word 'Brahms' adorned the young cop's badge, and as already mentioned, good fortune had chosen whom it sided with.

"Orosco?" Polasiky's muffled voice spoke out from behind them, muted with the bloodied tissue he held over his mouth.

There was an uncomfortable silence; save for the sound of reinforced glass relentlessly being beaten with bloodstained palms.

A/N: For all of those asking, the girl in chapter 27 (The cake theorem) was indeed Angela and Rodardian pretty much hit the nail on the head in his review. As to why she doesn't appear as 'Virgil' and isn't confined to that level of existence, well, that will be explained in a later chapter.

E.P.O: Heh, 'fraid not. She's just sympathetic


	36. Blue skies don't stretch forever

Appologies to Rodarian for misspelling your name…and when I said this only had four more chapters to go? Yeah, that was a lie, ten may be closer to the truth. I was being…grossly optimistic. Art of sloth has been put up.

Chapter 31: Blue skies don't stretch forever

Back in the once white car, everything had gone quiet. It had been that way ever since the rusty vehicle had pulled away from the car park out side Roy's dinner, leaving the vacant space to return to its familiar state of abandoned isolation.

However, this time there were only two people in the car.

Jobe gripped the steering wheel as tightly as he could without breaking the very bones in his hands. At least that way, he could keep them from wrapping around Grace's neck and throttling the very life out of her.

'Just don't think about it…' 

But there was always something that reminded him that the woman was still sitting next to him; even the small sound of her breathing prevented him from getting her both out of sight and mind. Despite keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the road ahead in hope that he could at least achieve the former of his two aims, from the corner of his eye he could still see the light tip of her shoe as it rested on the dashboard.

Frustration swelled, and like the taunt skin of a balloon, he could bare it no more.

"How could you do that?"

Grace didn't need to hear the tone in his voice to know he was hankering for an argument, hell, he'd practically been giving off sparks ever since they'd been boxed in this car together.

"Do what?" She drawled, shifting her feet. Grace already knew where this was going but that didn't mean she was going to let Jobe draw any satisfaction from whatever it was he was keeping cooped up inside him.

"Lie like that!" His voice rose, despite whatever attempt he made to keep control of it. Next to him, Grace sat up.

"Oh, and what was I meant to say, huh? I met her while being held hostage by a bed that was trying to eat me?" Jobe opened his mouth, but that was as close as he got to a comeback before Grace steamed on. "Anyways, you didn't have the balls to say anything…at least I did something!"

"For God's sake Grace, you just let them take her!"

"Jobe, there was nothing, and I mean nothing we could've done to stop them without being lugged into the back of that patrol car with her, so quit making out like you're some kind of martyr and let it go."

Jobe remained silent, his jaw jumping as he tried so hard not to see the logic in her argument. Of course, it was impervious to every point he mentally made.

"You didn't have to give them her name…" He muttered darkly. The only retort he could think of sounded fantastically childish in his ears and there was no doubt that Grace was going to make him eat his sullen words. Instead, she sighed with exasperation and gave. A little.

"Alright, I'll admit that was stupid, but how the fuck was I meant to know that cop had known her dad?"

Jobe bit his tongue and sighed, slumping into his seat. Yet again, that uncomfortable silence slowly crept like some lengthening shadow through the car, making even the thought of conversation seem somehow vulgar. The man let his mind turn off and let go as the slow, rhythmic pulses from the overhead neon lamps signalled the ever-nearing civilisation.

He was finally nearing his final destination…or so he thought.

8 8 8

As Jobe drove on to the town he called home, a squad car hurtled down a different stretch of highway to a small, remote (though not nearly as remote as Silent Hill) settlement known as Brahms. Inside this particular car, silence also reigned supreme, but unlike the one shared by Jobe and Grace, this one was far heavier, like that before a gathering storm that threatened to rip the very heavens apart.

The fair haired cop glanced at his broad partner from the corner of his eye, trying to decide if now was the best time to ask the question that had been buzzing inside his head ever since he and his partner had started this journey.

The guy was absolutely bristling, and Eric (the younger) wouldn't be surprised if he started foaming at the mouth any minuet. Oh well, no time like the present…

"What's got you so rattled about this particular…" He paused, searching for the right word. "Vagrant? You haven't said a word since that over-talkative cluts told us her name…" He left the sentence, hoping his superior would be in enough of a collected state of mind to fill the empty space that hung waiting in the air.

Polasiky pushed the gear-stick and the car whined. Eric winced.

"You're probably to young to remember the Orosco case?"

Eric ran through his extensive memory, but drew nothing but a load of blanks from its extensive resources. Next to him, the bear-like man's aura of anxiety began to rapidly wane and conversation began to warm into life.

"Ah, I wouldn't expect you to. It wasn't anything special, just another murder that was never solved and left to gather dust…"

Eric's brows furrowed ever so slightly, but never enough to let an actual wrinkle crease his brow.

"What's that got to do with her?" He jerked his head back, motioning at what lay in the back of the police car, behind the metal grate that separated the two cops from the object of his curiosity.

"Two years ago, I was called out to look in on a Mr. Thomas Orosco. He hadn't turned up at work at the lumber yard for a few days and the neighbours were beginning to worry about all the papers building up on the doorstep."

Polasiky turned to the man next to him a little more, no longer really whatching the empty road with all the attentiveness it demanded. "I won't lie to you, I used to be a friend of the man a long time ago but then the guy's wife split and he just…"

"Went off the rails?" Eric smoothly offered, not needing to see Polasiky nod to know he'd hit the nail on the head.

"You got it in one. Anyway, we fell out of touch after it…you gotta understand," He rushed, a little too eager to fill the space between his words. "The guy was never the same after that."

The younger cop wore an expression of sympathy, but to be honest, he was only bothered to half-listen to his partner's guilt ridden words. It was clear as day that the cop silently blamed himself for whatever happened, and that was all Eric cared about. Why should he feel for some blue-collar bum who couldn't handle a little domestic disturbance? After all, Eric saw himself as nothing less than a professional. A like any professional who may have found themselves in his current situation, he wanted nothing more than to know what this potentially lethal psycho (who, judging from the way she went for him, was in dire need of a rabies shot) was doing in the back of their car.

Hopefully he wasn't going to have to put up with this 'heart warming' drivel for much longer…

"I knew something was wrong, even before it was plain as day none was going to answer the door…it was just a vibe, you know?"

"So what did you do?" Eric asked in hope it would inspire his superior to get to the heart of the matter. Quickly.

"Well, I let myself in, and, sweet Jesus, it was the worst damn thing I've ever smelt. I found him in the front room and…" Polasiky choked, as it the phantom stench of slowly turning flesh had found his nose once again. Eric looked on, uncaring as the man shook his head, trying to rid it of whatever macabre image he had uncovered upon entering the Orosco household that yet again flashed in his mind's eye. "My god, someone had butchered the poor man"

_"That fucker deserved it…" _A voice hissed from the back of the squad car with a tongue so cold, ice would never melt on it. Just the sound of it manipulating the air made Polasiky shiver.

"What is it?" Eric asked, for once with genuine concern.

"Did she just…" He let the sentence die on seeing the blank look in his partners face and sunk somewhat stiffly back into his seat. "Never mind, I-I must be hearing things…"

Polasiky went on to explain how the forensic results had come back, conforming that D.N.A of his daughter had been found both on his body and at the scene of the crime but, miraculously, she'd somehow managed to disappeared into thin air just before people began to notice the lack of Thomas's presence and vanished without a trace.

To say all this was coincidence would be illogical by any standards and the somewhat lax police force had been more than happy to lay the blame at the now missing girl's feet. After all, it would save a hell of a lot of their time and effort to do so. Also, if the truth be told, none gave a damn about the not so tragic death of one, insignificant drunkard who's demise would be briefly mourned by over-sentimental fools like Polasiky and then forgotten.

Eric sat in quiet contemplation as Polasiky wrapped up the story, mulling over the details and taking time to analyse each and every one.

"So you're trying to tell me that this is his daughter?"

His partner snorted, chewing all the more violently on the wad of gum that had made its way into his mouth over the course of lengthy recital, bearing the brunt of his poorly disguised frustration.

"Well the damn name fits, don't it?"

In the back of the car, the girl we have come to know as Virgil sat, letting the words that volleyed between the two men float over her head. Whatever delirium had fuelled her earlier rage had fizzled out, leaving her empty and spent. Listlessly, she stared out the window, every now and again recognising a minor landmark that identified the murky town that had suddenly sprouted outside the window she stared dejectedly out of as the one Angela called home once upon a time.

She smiled crookedly; that all seemed like such a long time ago, however, her geography of the town wasn't so rusty that she couldn't foresee where the police car was ultimately heading. If she remembered correctly, they'd be at the 'hospital' in a matter of minuets.

Whatever Polasiky and his partner had been discussing in the front was quickly silenced as the thing that resided in the darkness behind them began to laugh…

8 8 8__

The rusty car's engine died abruptly as Jobe eased the key from the ignition and closed his eyes, basking in the quiet solitude. He'd dropped Grace off at an insignificant motel that resided near the town's border, it seemed fitting since the woman insisted she had nowhere to go and very little money to get there. Jobe, still feeling the fool for trying to blame her for his heavy conscious didn't pry and put some money towards one of the cheap and equally insignificant rooms. Grace didn't complain. Hell, after running around Silent Hill for little less than a day, even this badly kept motel was like a country manner compared to that godless town.

"It was nice to meet you…" She'd started as Jobe began to walk away from the cabin like room that the woman could temporally call home. "But next time, let try and do it somewhere that isn't so crazy."

Despite the sincerity of her words, neither truly believed this meeting would ever take place. Grace flashed on last smile at Jobe before closing the door on him for what both of them thought would be forever.

In the car, Jobe shuddered, but not because the ancient heater had finally given out, singing its frosty swan song with blasts of cold air. Rather, it was at the memory of just how tiered and haggard that parting smile had looked on Grace's face, as if it took some phenomenal mixture of all the will and fleeting strength in her body to pull it off. For it was in the harsh, neon light that radiated coldly from the room that framed her, Jobe had only just noticed how waxen and ill the woman looked. He wondered if the town had somehow left its mark on Grace, prematurely rotting her like neglected fruit and shivered again at the thought.

If it could do that to her, then what could it have done to him?

Jobe tore himself from the car, slamming the door shut behind him before the morbid thought could tumble out after him. Pulling yet another set of keys from the sanctuary of a buttoned down pocket, Jobe raced up the steps of the apartment building he'd parked outside and, ignoring the nonexistent sounds of his turmoil thoughts scraping on the glass window of the car, baying for his attention with plaintive mews, he fumbled with the lock.

'It's over…' 

He couldn't shut the door behind him fast enough, breaking away from it immediately as he lurched along the hallway, dragging the broken leg behind him. He didn't even allow himself to think as yet again he fiddled with the key ring, seemingly numb to the rest of the world as he closed in on the room he called home.

He opened the door and when his eyes fell upon the familiar setting, all the emotions he'd been holding together throughout this entire, horrific odyssey finally broke free and effortlessly swallowing the man.

Julia emerged from some deeper point of the apartment they shared in time to see her boy-friend slump down to the floor, already weeping tears born of pain, fear and sorrow.

However, though made up from all these bitter ingredients, they were mostly tears of joy.


	37. Judgment in Red

Sorry this took so long, it's another of those lengthy 5 page specials…Thannkyou so much to everyone who has reviewed, it really is most encouraging.

Chapter 32: Judgement in red

Just like they sung in that particularly corny hymn, morning had broken. Jobe lay on his back, enjoying the feel of the soft bed sheets against his skin as he watched the sun's pale, red fingertips slowly crept across the ceiling.

He'd never appreciated it before…

Jobe closed his eyes and drank in the silence- no, not silence. That word had taken on a whole new meaning to Jobe. Silence was something terrifying, the sound of your own blood thrashing against your temples as you try to bottle up a scream that bays to run lose, ripping you up from the inside like some lethal infection.

_'Quietness is such a nicer term.'_ Jobe smiled, happy with the outcome of this particular meditation and let his mind, which felt lighter than ever, wonder back to the events of last night.

The fit, which verged dangerously on hysterical had only lasted a few, curt minuets and Julia had remained silent thorough, whatching the shaking form of Jobe with large, worried eyes. He could still feel those twin pools of harrowing concern on him even as she joined him on the floor, wrapping her arms around him and patently waited for him to get over whatever it was torturing him so.

The tears gradually subsided, along with the internal tremors that shook Jobe so viciously and the two shared the sudden noiseless that filled the apartment like an empty vacuum.

Finally, when it reached the point that this mute force threatened to burst, Julia broke the silence with the words Jobe had been dreading from the moment he'd first seen her blurry outline through tear-stained eye.

"What happened to you?"

It was inevitable. Even if Jobe had come strutting in and grinning from ear to ear, his rank appearance would have woken the spark of curiosity in even the most unobservant soul, and Julia was far from that…

Jobe would have given anything to just unload his woes and take of the mask there and then, however, as empathic as his girlfriend was, he doubted she would swallow a story that's dark chapters contained tales of the coming of god, monsters and the fanatics that worshiped them. Topping that all of with the revelation that not six hours ago, he'd splattered his once best friend's gut on the wall with a shotgun… well, she'd be on the phone dialling the number of the nearest funny farm in no time.

So Jobe told a glorious lie, the words just lolling of his tongue as he covered up his immediate, and down right disturbing past with a brand new lick of paint that made a much prettier picture.

He had Phil had been driving back when an argument erupted between the two and swiftly plunged into very morbid territory. Hateful, hurtful words had been exchanged and very quickly, blows followed. The conflict reached its climax when Phil threw Jobe out of the car, leaving him in the mist as he tore off.

Jobe then walked to the nearest town, a certain Silent Hill, but was forced off the road by the ever thickening mist that descended on the region, smothering everything with a milky hew. At some point, he'd tripped and cut his leg quite badly on a rock that had snuck up on him (ironic that that was more believable than the far-fetched truth) but by some miracle, he'd final reached the town. From there, he'd somehow managed to rent a car and hauled ass home.

Julia didn't question even one detail of the fabricated tail but for some reason, that hadn't made Jobe feel any better. They'd gone to bed, the man expecting nothing more than a sleepless night as his heavy conscious crushed him into the mattress beneath him, but the minuet his head had hit the pillow, Jobe had slipped into a deep and utterly consuming sleep.

And that pretty much brings us back to where we started off.

Jobe looked to his left, his eyes wondering slowly over the creased mounds of the sheets until his gaze became trapped in a forest of familiar curly hair.

_'She's still asleep.'_ the man noted to none but his own content self, noting the rhythmic slowness with which her chest rose and fell. _'No point in waking her.'_ Jobe tore himself from the blanket's comforting embrace and stumbled from the bed, brisking himself against the less that welcoming morning air.

He'd been mulling over nothing in particular as he sat in the kitchen, hunched over a cup of coffee when he noticed the blinking light that rhythmically pulsated from the phone set. The dull grey contraption winked tirelessly at Jobe from the opposite end of the table he was sat as, the small, red flash advertising the fact that someone had left a message.

It was more out of practised habit than curiosity that made the man lent across to it, pressing down on the play button clumsily as he tried to slot himself back into the world of the living. As the mechanical voice whirred into life, Jobe settled back into the seat, eagerly hugging the cup in his hands as if he had the power to leech the precious warmth from it into his own cold being.

"_You have one new message_," The artificial voice chirruped with forced enthusiasm. "_Message one…_" __

BEEP 

Jobe suddenly realised that he'd been listening to nothing but empty sounds of the kitchen for an ever-lengthening stretch of time. He cast the phone set a doubtful glace as it remained dumb and reached over to it, his finger hovering over the 'clear' button, eager to do away with this ghost in the machine.

"_I wouldn't do that if I were you_…"

Jobe started back into his chair at the sound of the voice cracking through the noiseless room, staring at the machine with wide eyed disbelief as the message continued to play.

"_What? Don't tell me you're afraid to hear what we have to" _But that was all the voice managed to say as Jobe pummelled the little green button, silencing it with a sharp, electronic screech as the phone wiped whatever it had to preach from the memory.

His heart was still hammering in his ears as Jobe lent stiffly back in his chair. He raised the mug to his lips but found he no longer hankered after the thick liquid that suddenly smelt so bitter.

"_You have one new message, message one_."

The mug fell from Jobe's hands as the phone kicked into life once again, but he headed no attention to the harsh crack of ceramic on the tiled floor.

"_Didn't we just tell you not to do that? Don't think you can hide_"

This time, Jobe nearly fractured the plastic coating as he hit the machine, cutting it off mid sentence. For what felt like an hour compressed into a few short seconds, he stood over the phone set, trying to control the bile rising in his throat. What the hell was going on?

"_You have one new message_…" It began, but Jobe didn't hear the rest of its speech.

"FUCK OFF!" He grabbed the machine in both hands and hurled the machine into the nearest wall with every iota of strength as if it bore some terrible, contagious desies he would contract if he held it for a second longer.

The phone set hit the plastered surface and splintered like bone. It landed on the floor in an undignified heap of exposed circuits and obscure, metal organs as the casing came apart, exposing its dry innards. Jobe stared at the broken object as if he expected the machine to lunge at him, propelling itself towards him on those bare, tendril like wires that now lay strewn across the kitchen floor.

A cold silence ensued, its sudden snare over the now still environment made Jobe suddenly wonder if he'd heard anything at all. After all, he'd been through a lot over the past day, maybe his mind was just playing tricks on him…yes, that had to be it.

"_Don't tell us you're going to even lie to yourself_…" The voice hissed from the wreckage of the phone, stopping Jobe's heart dead in his chest. "_But then, you're very good at lying, aren't you Jobe?_"

The man leapt up from the chair, and before he could stop himself, the words were out of his mouth.

"What the hell do you want from me?" Jobe even went as far as clapping a hand over his still moving lips but it was to late. He'd acknowledged this antagonistic entity and there was no way now he could kid himself into believing it was some by-product of his disturbed mind.

"_What do we want? We want you to see the truth you so stubbornly ignore_," The voice whispered, growing more ragged and wet with each syllable. "_You've lied, Jobe. You've lied to Angela, you've lied to Grace, but most importantly, you've lied to yourself! You insisting on burying yourself in this web of lies, so deeply that you've forgotten what is real!_"

Despite all that his inner voice hollered at him not to, Jobe had slowly made his way over to the artificial carcass that whispered to him beyond the grave, looking down at it with a chocking mixture of plain fear and disbelief. It rose a notch within him when he realised he'd heard this voice before in a dank, perpetuity dark corner of _that_ town…

"_We cannot understand why you refuse to hold onto this fabricated reality. Everything would be so much simpler if you just let it go…and float away_."

In his mind's eye, Jobe could see the black, serpentine tongue lashing against the horde of oversized teeth that filled the poisonous mouth of the speaker as its words disintegrated into a low hiss.

"_We've tried to show you the truth before, but you chose to ignore it. We think the time has come for usss to try again. tell me LIAR, how do you REALLY feel about that pretty girl of yours?_"

The words bubbled away into a sickly laughter as the inhumane voice disintegrated into hysterics. Something black began to ooze from between the cracks that split the phone set, the viscous liquid lazily crawling between the tiles that made up the kitchen floor like some ravenous cancer as it spread out from its epicentre.

Jobe was already gone by the time the once pristine tiles immediately surrounding the phone had been completely consumed by the tar-like sludge, racing through the small living space between the gradually flooding kitchen and the bedroom. Even though it was less than ten steps to clear the short distance, Jobe felt as though he'd run a marathon as those bare few steps stretched into uncountable miles.

Even after all he'd been through, the man had never been so consumed by such terror as that which seized him as he burst through the bedroom door. Nothing, not even the most disturbing image that Silent Hill had scalded into his mind could match the raw fear of the unknown that held onto him as he steadied himself, bare feet gripping desperately to the carpeted floor as he took in the scene around him.

At first, Jobe couldn't understand what it was his eyes were trying to show him. The bedroom was fine, the fingers of corruption that had snared the kitchen were yet to pry in here and everything seemed in order.

Except for the bed.

He shook his head, soundless words spelling out on his moving lips as he tried to comprehend its condition. There was a noticeable hump in the centre of crumpled sheets that now seemed dyed with tones of brown and red as if the very material had begun to rust.

"no" Jobe uttered, his voice sounding o so small in the silent (yes, for it is fair to use this word as Jobe had come to understand it in this context) room, feeling sicker by the second.

The final detail was the one that made the man collapse to the floor, his knees giving out beneath him as his brain crashed, shocked into total numbness by what lay before it.

From the centre of what Jobe had finally come to accept as the human shaped mound was something rising perpendicular from where its chest would be, but all detail was masked by the sodden sheet that smothered it.

_'That body… it…it just can't be her under there…_' Jobe forced himself to his feet, the world swimming before him as he tripped towards the bed, his feet catching on nothing but the empty air. Somehow, he managed to force him self closer to it, trying so hard not to see the little details like the clumps of matted hair, tinted as red as the sheet they clung to. His eyes fell upon the familiar, slender hand that hung lifelessly from the side of the bed, escaping from beneath the sheet and the soft, comforting numbness left him. Suddenly, he was more than aware of just how vibrant and fresh those stains were, so very akin to the colour of blood. And then there was the smell…

Jobe had become acquainted with the smell of death during his stay in Silent Hill, but the smell that burnt away at his nasal cavity was a thousand times worse. The rich odder of turning flesh invaded his throat, pouring into his stomach like lead.

The man finally cracked, becoming enlightened to the true meaning of the term 'sensory overload'.

He screamed, and was still screaming when the thing under the sheets sat up.

Jobe fell back, trying to hold onto the few shards of sanity he still had as the head beneath the sheet turned and locked onto him with covered eyes, the sheet still clinging onto it like a filthy cowl.

It swung its legs over the edge of the bed, both limbs battered to the point where most of the skin was covered in ugly blotches of blue and black and rose with deliberately slow grace.

Something moved under the sheet.

"Oh dear god…"It locked around whatever it was sticking from the entity's chest and a low, moist sucking noise filtered out from under the sheet as it was pulled free from its once living resting place. Its arm fell it its side, now clasping the mystery object.

A baseball bat…

The very same one Jobe's brother had given to him a countlessly long time ago for Christmas and had been in his possession ever since, but he no longer felt the spontaneous burst of happiness that usually filled him when his eyes fell upon the crafted wood. Now, coated with a fresh lick of gore that winked at him in the pale, morning light, it made every inch of his skin crawl.

"…Why…?" He looked up at the thing he never wanted to identify, towering above him like some snowy mountain, tainted by the setting sun. "What happened to you?"

The obelisk of material's only reply was to smash the bat into the side of Jobe's head and for half a second, the man truly believed he could see the stars as he reeled back into the carpet. It took a step forward, raising the bat high above it as it prepared to smash the fallen man apart.

Jobe rolled, turning in time to see the bludgeon crack against the floor with enough force to turn his skull to nothing but a runny pulp if it had still been there. The thing gathered itself, its covered eyes somehow seeking out the man's position as Jobe madly scrabbled away from it on his back, hitting into the desk at the other end of the room. From beneath the sheet, it watched as the man looked up and an expression of unadulterated fear spread across his face as he realised he had nowhere left to go.

It took a step forward.

Jobe's eyes locked with the pinnacle of the bloodied sheet, wide and dry as panic yanked mercilessly at his optic nerves as he pulled himself up the desk, watching helplessly as the thing drew ever nearer with each paced step of its battered feet.

"Please, don't do this…"

His weak, hollow words sounded so very pathetic in his ears and had no impact on the thing bent on crushing him as it took another step forwards, the distance between them drawing dangerously thin.

His clammy hands, soaked with cold sweat began to wonder blindly over the desk's smooth surface in search of something, nay, anything he could defend himself with.

His fingers had just kissed the rounded surface of a stone paperweight when it spoke.

"Do on to others…" The voice creaked like rust on an old joint, sending Jobe's very brain quivering as if it had somehow managed to get inside his head and rack its fingers over the fragile organ.

"…**As you'd have them** **DO ONTO YOU**!" Its voice rose, slicing into the man's ears as it reached a high, avian pitch. The bat soared again, hovering momentarily at its lethal peek…

…But that brief gap, that momentary hesitation was all the time Jobe's fingers needed to lock around the heavy rock and smash it into the side of the thing's head.

And for a moment time stopped.

They stood, frozen in that position for what felt a little short of ever, the paperweight snugly resting in its newfound nest of fractured bone and the bat still caught in motionless flight.

However, nothing lasts forever. A moan, a sad, painfully human noise escaped the covered lips of the clocked being, and before its plaintive swan song was out, it had collapsed to the floor in a heap of broken limbs and sodden sheets.

Even though the cover had remained on it throughout the whole scene, the one that had masked Jobe's eyes had finally fallen away. Now, he could all to clearly see the features of the one hand and stray strands of hair that had escaped the oppressive cover, and they were unmistakably familiar.

They were Julia's

"Oh-" But that was all Jobe managed to say before the emotions that had been numbed by adrenalin eventually caught up with him.

He fell…

And for the first time, the pain of loss took its final toll and pierced his heart, ripping it to shreds. The broken man curled up on the floor and cried, utterly alone save for the sound of silence's bitter laughter.

Time passed, but the agony refused to fade until one single thought snapped him out of his bleak state of mind. He sat up, so fast that the blood flooded his head and uttered a single word.

"Grace…"

8 8 8

The woman in question opened her eyes for the first time since she'd collapsed onto the motel-standard single bed without even a hint of her namesake, stirring into life with a hacking cough. Blindly, her hand shot out to the bedside table in a frantic search for her cigarettes, scrambling over a bible that looked as though it hadn't been consulted for a long time.

"Shit…" She hissed unnecessarily to herself when her groggy brain remembered that she'd left the precious sticks of nicotine in her discarded trouser pocket…

Wait a minuet, what was she doing in a motel?

Grace sat up, the lethargy instantly leaving her as the fog of sleep dissolved, revealing the events of the last day.

"Oh shit…" The woman stared dumbly into her lap as the memories of all that had taken place in the town of Silent Hill bit into her with teeth sharper than any of the faceless monstrosities they'd encountered there. It was as if the room's lowly radiator had turned traitor, plunging the room into negative figures in a matter of a few spars seconds.

The woman's jaw began to tremble, she felt colder and sicker than she could ever remember in al her twenty four years of life…

And had never been in such desperate need of a cigarette.

Grace fell out of bed, swearing loudly in the pale, grey morning light as she caught her foot on the bedside table.

'Well, it's all over now. All we need to do is put some miles between us and this god forsaken dump and we can put this whole thing be- FUCK'

Grace grabbed her knee. We'll just say that she'd found the chair and leave it at that but she was still swearing like a sailor as she returned the trousers to their proper place.

The short, nova-like flash from the lighter had just died when the knock on the door sounded. The soft orange, light from the illuminated fag illustrated the woman's face as her brows knit, the green eyes narrowing into lean, suspicious slits.

"Who is it?"

Grace became suddenly aware of how bumped the skin on the back of her neck in the silence that ensued.

Whoever it was knocked again, beating so hard against the wood that it rattled against its hinges yet remaining as dumb as the material it pounded.

_'Jobe didn't pay for my room and now the owner wants his due?'_ Her brain offered, still warming up as it tried to think straight through the soothing haze of nicotine that buzzed through its cells. Yeah, that had to be it, why else would the knocker sound so pissy?

"Hang on!" Grace muttered from the side of her mouth as she went for the door. God, whoever seeked her company at this early hour was going to break the wooden panel in if they hit the poor thing any harder…

Her lips lost their soggy grip on the paper cylinder as she uttered that sentence, the illuminated cigarette tumbling from its living zenith and crashing into the carpet.

"Aw shit," Grace added to her list of profanities as she ducked to grab the fallen fag. "Hold on a sec…"

However, this wasn't good enough for the entity that had been waiting less than patiently on the other side of the door and it hammered down on the door…

…And this time, the wood truly did splinter.

Grace screamed, falling back as the dull, metal object sliced through the wood as if it were nothing but a paper panel. In the pale, morning light, the sparse rays of light that managed to filter into the room danced along the enormous…what the woman could only describe as a blade's edge. From where she lay, spread out on the floor, it looked very, very sharp.

There was a creek as its wielder pulled the obscene weapon back, cracking the brittle wood as it yanked it violently free and peace returned to the small motel room, save for the harsh sound of Grace's hyper-ventilation as she stared wide eyed at the hole in the door. It didn't last long.

CRUNCH 

The door finally gave, fracturing under the inhuman stress and exploding into a fine rain of splinters. Grace was already on her feet as her visitor stumbled through the remaining chunks of painted wood that tried in vain to hold their original position, diving headlong into the Spartan 'on suite' bathroom. She threw the door shut, only just catching a glimpse her assailant's shadowy form as it lumbered into the room before the door latched to. To say it was human would safely be underestimate if the year, if not century.

Her hands flew to the lock, snapping the small, metal contraption into place and suddenly time, which had seemed to have been flying past at a hundred and seventy miles per hour, slowed to a crawl.

"Moron…" A mumbling scold rose from her lips, but I think we can safely guess what her first, unheard word was.

What's the one thing you don't do in situations like this, a point that had been finely illustrated in almost every horror movie since the dawn of time? Lock yourself in a room (which, conveniently, you can't get out of) while there's a blade-wielding maniac on the rampage and out for blood. Persificaly yours.

As Grace's eyes flew over the detail's of the tiny, tiny room, she realised she'd put herself into that exact position.

The lurid green shower curtain wasn't going to offer any protection from… whatever the hell that thing was, nor were the toilet or sink nailed to the wall that stared starkly at her, as if muttering: what an idiot. Oh well, you'll be dead soon.

She ran her finger's through her hair so hard she nearly ripped the brittle strands from her head, weakened by years of colouring and straightening as her eyes raced over the details of the small room that was going to become her final resting place if she didn't do something soon. After analysing each detail of it at least fifty times, she finally noticed the window above the toilet. She was nearly floored by the sense of deja vu that flooded her.

The woman leapt up on to the toilet's water tank as the thing smashed into the other side of the door, rattling the one and only barricade between her and it. She tried to ignore the sound of her oncoming doom as she went to fling the window open…

Only to find it was sealed shut.

"Fuck!"

There was no handle, no hinges, nothing except for a blank pane of glass that stubbornly refused to budge.

'**CRUNCH**'

Grace cast a hopeless glance over her shoulder as it beat against the glass again, her stomach liquidating when she saw the wood begin to fall away in sharp, angular sections as the colossal blade ripped through it.

She looked back to the window. It mocked her. This one, tiny piece of opaque material was all that stood between her and freedom.

_'This is going to hurt so much…_' Grace shut her eyes as the thing broke through the wood, tearing down the battered door with its bear hands and rocked her head back, quietly asking herself just how much it would…

Grace slammed her head forward and found the answer to her question as her skull cracked through the thin pane.

It hurt. A lot.

But she didn't care, the woman was too pumped up on a cocktail of terror and adrenalin to notice as she scrabbled rabidly through the broken window, paying no heed to the sharp renaments of glass that bit into her skin as she wriggled through.

The door finally gave as the great knife ploughed through it, shattering any remains of the door that still stood. It stepped through, its tough, leathery feet crunching the flakes of wood in to the tiled floor, evidently not feeling the splinters that punctured its bare soles. It was here to do one thing, and one thing alone.

'_Make her answer to the call of god…'_ Those were its simple instruction, and nothing on earth could or would-

It stopped dead, laxing the grip it had on the handle of its obscene weapon. You may ask what had the power to stop this behemoth in its tracks when locks and doors had little to no effect. It was the simple fact that the bathroom was empty…

8 8 8

"Ouch…" Grace pushed herself up from the bed of broken glass, winking merrily up at her like fine crystals from the wooden pavilion that ran along the outside of her room with a groan. She felt as though someone had just forced her head into a meat grinder, probably looked it too…and that short flight from the bathroom window did precious little to help.

She staggered to her feet, grabbing onto the railing that marked the end of the wooden walkway and blundered on feet that seemed to have forgotten how to walk towards the pavilion's short series of steps.

"Move, goddamnit!" She hurdled past the now empty crater that had replaced her room's door, trying to spur herself on. She had to get out of here…but where to go?

Grace grinded to a halt at the top of the short flight of steps, the breath catching in her throat as she took in her surroundings. Someone might as well have erased them with some divine rubber as she slept, for the car-park that all the cabin-like rooms encircled had gone, swallowed by a dense fog that seemed to have rolled in from nowhere over night.

Hope crumpled like unneeded paper. For some reason, that blanketing layer of fog seemed like a more solid, trapping wall than anything constructed from brick and mortar could ever be.

Something moved in behind her and Grace suddenly remberd the reason why her heart was beating so feverishly hard in her chest. Hopeless panic gripped the woman as she went for the steps but her foot overshot the mark, missing its target completely. She barely managed a scream as gravity took over and she fell, rolling down the short flight in a heap, letting out a short cry of protest as the edge of each step bit into her.

She hit the floor, inhaling a lungful of dust as she moaned, trying to comprehend the pain that swelled inside her.

'_Get up_' some distant voice called, appealing to whatever determination was left in the battered woman, but it seemed so very weak. Wouldn't it just be so much easier to call an end to this mismatched battle and just slip away? There was no way she could win this one, not now.

Grace lifted her buzzing head from the ground, the grit that itched her face clinging sullenly to her skin. She looked up the steps that had just now claimed any hope she had of making some sort of escape, blinking as her eyes tried to remember how to focus but when she saw the figure who stood at the top of them, even her eyelids froze in their fluttering dance.

She…she had to be seeing things…

She blinked again, but it was still there and Grace came to realise that the inhuman entity that towered over her like some bloody monarch was no figment of her exhausted imagination; it was real. What else could explain the details her eyes picked up? Like the way its moist skin glinted in the sickly morning light, as if the organ itself was a separate, living entity, or how its shoulder's rose and fell with each paced breath as it bode its time, trying to judge just when would be the right time to descend upon the fallen woman. Also, the little things like the way it altered its grip on long blade's handle just made it all the more convincing…and then there was what Grace guessed was its head. For a long while, the woman goggled at the creature Jobe had dubbed 'the red judge' in his short time in the hotel, something the beast could add to the long repertoire of names it had been branded with over the years. However, not a single one came close to its true, beautiful title:

Xuchilbara.

The helmet like structure tipped forward as it loomed down at Grace, the unseen eyes glaring at her from beneath the obscure, metallic mask.

It took a step.

And that was all it took to snap Grace from the catatonic, dumb state of fear that had locked down her entire system.

The woman turned onto her back, scrabbling backwards as fast as she could, oblivious to the bits of jagged grip that scratched at her hands as she propelled herself away from the flight of stairs.

It took another, the blade trailing listlessly behind the creature that appeared to be clothed in a smock of long dead rags.

Grace's hands had begun to bleed, but she didn't care. All her mind could focus on was the ever-approaching monstrosity.

Its gnarled, leathery feet touched down on the grainy surface of the car park.

She struggled to her feet, teetering on the spot as she tried to tell her shaking legs to remain still, if just for a moment. Who was she kidding, there was no way she was getting out of this one alive or even in one piece. Grace no longer seemed capable of walking, let alone breaking into a sprint and losing the lumbering hulk in the mist, unless of course fate granted her a miracle… and it wasn't like they'd been falling from the sky recently.

Well, that _had_ been Grace's train of thought until the sound of a car's wheezing engine suddenly flared from some inpeantirble point in the mist as the tail-tell mechanical snarl rapidly grew.

Both the woman and her unholy antagonist looked up, and under its gory helmet, it probably wore the exact same expression of shock as a blaze of high powered headlights sliced through fog, making the moisture that danced in the air glow a hazy white.

Grace stood motionless, finally achieving that control over her weakened body that she'd so desperately sought, caught in the suddenness of the moment for a bare moment until the car ripped from the fog, ploughing into malevolent being that had stood only five meters away from her. As quickly as the car had come, it vanished and dragged the morbid body with it, sinking back into the smothering blanket of grey that had seeped over every inch of the car park. All of this was accompanied by the wailing screech of tires on the lose gravel chips that composed the ground as the car grinded to a halt, the twin red break-lights momentarily illuminated the fog as they blinked on.

Grace watched them as they clicked off, trying to run over the rushed series of events in her brain, as if to make sure it had all really happened.

The sound of a car door slamming shut was all that was needed to seal the deal with her dazed brain and short-term memory. The woman staggered forwards, unable to stop the mad grin that cracked her face as the familiar, white, rust-bucket of a car slowly solidified before her from the cloud of murk, its outline becoming all the more certain with each dragged step she took.

8 8 8

Jobe leapt from the car, his eyes rabidly scanning the sparse patch of gravel that stood out from the fog before him. Where was it? He'd hit something; hell the brand-new dent in the centre of the car's stained bonnet was a bold testament to that…

So where was the body? Had it crawled off into the mist to die, or was that inhuman thing he'd barely managed to catch sight of lurking somewhere in the milky backdrop, biding its time…

Jobe was saved from his grim meditation as a familiar voice bayed from the fog.

"Jobe?"

The man turned, harkening to his name as something leapt at him from the heavy mist, catching and binding the man in hard embrace.

"Wha-"

He stopped, the blurb of surprise catching in his throat. His fears weren't confirmed; for it wasn't that thing he'd hit that held him in an iron death grip…

It was only Grace.

Jobe let himself relax as the woman he'd come searching for melted, hanging herself around his neck, sobbing bitterly into his chest.

"She's right, it's not going to let us go, is it?" Grace's muffled voice rose from between the creases of his shirt. Jobe said nothing, but then, she never really did expect an answer…

For a long while, the pair stood in this numb embrace, framed in the harsh light of the car's headlamps.

A/N- well, all of you wondering how this could go on, I hope that answered your question and we'll be back to Angela next chapter.

E.P.O, I must ask, why did you write Beatrix?


	38. The in between

Art of Virgil has been added.

I know I said we were going to see what befell her this chapter, but I wanted to do this short one (well, short in the case of this story) first. Next chapter, I promise and I Guess what happened to Julia was not a shock.

I think…we've got nine chapters to go till this little tail is over…

Chapter 33: The in between

"OW!"

Jobe fell back into the car seat that had carried him all the way from Silent Hill and most of the way back again, staring in morbid awe at the bloodied slither of glass gripped tight between his index finger and thumb.

"Sonova…" Next to him, Grace crumbled into her hands, clutching at her face as she swore into them.

"What the hell did you do anyway?" Jobe looked up from the streaked shard that had been buried deep within her skin at the bent woman next to him. The question had been begging to be let free from within the confides of his mouth ever since he'd looked up from the wheel of the car as they pulled out of that misty car park and realised that the woman's face was a mess of clotting crimson streaks.

"Let's just say I tried to open a window and it didn't really work out…" She moaned from behind her criss-crossed fingers, still refusing to let go of her wounded face.

Jobe lent back in the cushy seat, tender from old age, and glared at the world beyond the windshield of the faithful, off-white car. He sighed, leaving Grace to recover on her own, loud way.

The pair had chosen to drive back to Brahms, the fog melting away behind them to reveal bright blue skies. It would be nigh on impossible for anyone to even entertain the thought that such dark events had taken place on what was turning out to be such a beautiful day. Anyone except for Jobe.

Needless to say, Grace had picked up on the fact that he was not the man who had dropped her off at the motel the previous night when everything looked as though it was finally taking a turn towards normality (heck, even something with as little empathy as an amoeba could tell there was something eating the man from the inside out) and made the fatal mistake of asking what was wrong.

That one, tiny, little increase in pressure was all it took for the fragile walls Jobe had built around himself to come crumbling down.

Grace had had to wrench the wheel from the man's hands, saving the car from ploughing into the edge of the road as Jobe lost control of everything. Seeing that that they weren't about to crash into the barrier that raced along the side of the tarmac strip, Grace cast a more than worried glance at Jobe as the man fell back into his seat, his eyes streaming as if the blood from those freshly inflicted wounds had found a way to escape through his tear ducts, oozing out in great torrents. For the first time that day, Grace chose to take the rational option and brought the car to a rolling halt on the side of the road.

It sat there, motionless under a sign that proclaimed in bold white print to the world that there was only another twenty miles to go until those who took this road crossed into Brahms.

Grace sat, trying not to listen to the man next to her as he cried, the bitter, long sobs turning her stomach sour. When he finally regained control and reined in the emotions that had so freely surfaced, she suddenly found herself whishing he hadn't stopped. The silence that leaked into the car from the cold outside made her want to let lose like a fog horn and scream and scream until all the burning pressure and conferment that polluted her innards like a toxin was out of the woman, leaving her blissfully empty.

"What is it?" God, did her voice really sound so small and broken in the dusty enclosure of this car? Jobe blinked slowly, coming out of the foggy plane of memories Grace's innocent question had created and looked at her, and she saw that the lively spark that had once inhabited his black eyes had been snuffed out. It was as if someone had gouged out those charismatic orbs and replaced them with soulless hunks of coal.

And so, for the second time since Angela had 'liberated' it from the hospital, the vehicle quietly listened as yet it absorbed yet another harrowing tale of bloody violence, but this time the narrative was supplied by Jobe himself. The man wrapped it up, hiding not one single detail from the woman, perhaps in some subconscious attempt to prove the twisted voice on the other end of the phone wrong. Murderer, yes, he'd had that title thrust upon him but he hadn't lied to anyone.

He came to an end and the air between the two filled with a pregnant silence. Jobe's eyes briefly flashed upon Grace's face, the action begging for her to pass judgment.

But the silence seemed to have finally converted her to its dumb religion.

Now, I must tell you that it wasn't fear or spite that clamped the woman's lips tight. It was inexperience.

Grace suddenly realised that she'd never listened to anyone ever before, not even in her un-educational and down right wasted school days. It was never she who lent a shoulder to cry on or an attentive ear, but forced the whole world to listen to her as she moaned about things that seemed so critical at the time yet fantastically trivial only months later.

It didn't make her feel any better.

Nor did the fact that she was letting this awkward silence spin out even longer than it already had.

_'Say something!'_

What?

_'ANYTHING!'_

"So… you killed her?"

Usually, it takes a second or two before a person realises what they said and gets that 'why can't the ground open up and swallow me?' feelings. Grace had it even before the words had left her mouth, wincing at the sound of her own damning voice. 'Wow, that was tactful' 

She wouldn't blame the guy if he turned round and punched her there and then…

"She was already dead…that _thing…_" He paused, spitting the word as if it left a savoury tang in his mouth. " It wasn't her. That town…it did something to her and it's not going to stop. EVER! There's just no getting away from that damned place!" Jobe turned on the woman, bristling as his words cut the air. It was only when he saw how Grace had pressed herself into the car door in some desperate attempt to put as much distance between her and his rabid self that he realised he'd started screaming the words. "Sorry…" He sat back in his seat, sighing heavily and looked up into the heavens. The stained car roof blocked his view.

"What are we going to do now then?"

Jobe snorted through flared nostrils, leaving Grace to fiddle obsessively with the cigarette lighter that had miraculously wormed its way into her hand.

"We're going back."

There was a soft thud somewhere in the bowls of the car as the silver lighter slipped from the woman's suddenly deathly still hands.

"What?!" Had she heard him right? Did he say they were actually going to go back to that town after having more near death experiences there to last anyone with a shard of sanity a lifetime? He had to be kidding.

"After we get Virgil," His voice was horribly steady and it dawned on Grace that there wasn't going to be a punch line. "We're going to drive back there and find out just what it is those two had planed for us… and make sure it doesn't happen."

From the way his teeth gritted together, it would take an imbecile to not guess that Jobe had bloody murder on his mind.

"Oh, they're going to pay for what they did to us."

Grace felt the skin on the back of her neck rise up as the car sailed out of its tempary parking space and resumed hammering down the road to Brahms. She didn't want to do this, but then, the madman next to her was right. If they didn't do something, this was never going to end and she'd have to live the rest of her life in a fearful cycle. Run. Wait for the town to find her. Run. The cycle resumes…

Grace sighed as the sun dipped behind a cloud, leaving the world dull.

8 8 8

And so, that pretty much brings us back to where we started. Through a long, tedious process of elimination, Jobe and Grace had learnt that Angela was being held at Brahms's National Hospital.

They'd been sitting in the car park when Grace had caught sight of her face in the side-mirror and nearly passed out.

For someone with a face full of glass, she'd sure taken a long time to notice it.

Jobe had spent five minuets pulling each of the crystal splinters out of his companions face, turning a deaf ear to her violent screams and occasional death-threats; after all, you don't want to go into a hospital to look for someone when you look as though you deserve to be admitted yourself.

Even Before Jobe's eyes had adjusted to the harsh, neon lights that blared down from the hospital's spotless white ceiling, the man could tell there was something wrong. It was as if the air had overloaded with static.

"What the…" Grace hopped back as a nurse scuttled past her, nearly bowling the twiggy woman over in her panicky haste. She cast the woman a bitter look, but that melted when her eyes focused on the rest of the room. A strange menagerie of doctors, nurses and assorted staff members milled about the entrance hall, each one trying to out shout the other as they tried to get their message across. If one were to look up chaos in the dictionary, there would probably be a still of this scene right next to it.

Somehow, the two managed to keep together as they squirmed their was through the great living mass of white coats and make it to the reception desk in one piece only to find things were even worse.

"Can I help you?" on of the woman behind the counter glanced up, only half acknowledging their existence before the phone beside her screamed into life, the shrill ring joining the cacophony of pure noise that racketed through out the small space. Jobe strained his ears, trying to make out even a snippet of the conversation between the receptionist (who, to be frank, looked as though she was on the verge of having a cardiac arrest) and the caller.

"Hello?….don't know…..vanished, just vani…yes, but…."

Even in the over packed room, that familiar sense of dread had singled Jobe out, plunging its icy fingers into his neck.

"What did she say?" A very pissed of looking Grace turned her face up to his before yet another doctor smacked into her with his bony shoulder.

Jobe opened his mouth to answer but the hot air of the busy room only invaded his mouth for a blink of time before someone was shouting at him.

"Can I help you?!" The receptionist slammed the plastic phone down hard enough to shatter it and Jobe woundn't be shocked if she started foaming at the mouth anytime now.

"Uh, yes…we're here to see a friend of ours who was brought here last-"

"I'm sorry, but that won't be possible." Jobe frowned at the woman's snappy words.

"But, why?"

The receptionist rolled her eyes and sighed. How many times was she going to have to tell people this today?

"Some time last night, thirty people, that's staff members AND patients disappeared from the hospital."

Grace glanced at the woman from the corner of her slit eye.

"What d'ya mean 'disappeared'?"

The receptionist shot the woman a dark scowl. Clearly, this wasn't a question that she wanted to hear.

"They just vanished into thin-" But that was all that she got to say on the matter as the telephone next to her started squalling again.

"How much would you want to bet that this has something to do with our little problem?" Jobe just nodded in dumb response, his stony face fixed on some distant point. Man, if he stayed in here for just one more minute, this noise was going to drive him stark raving mad…

And that was when his ears picked up on a particular tone that pierced the humdrum of sound, a noise he had heard so long ago just before everything took a nosedive for the worst. Nervously, he caught sight of Grace as she shook her head.

"Man, what's that noise…"

It sounded like someone was dragging a piece of glass over a chalkboard and singing in a pitch so sharp, it made your ears want to bleed.

Grace stuck a finger in her ear, but that just made the searing hum worse, as if she'd trapped it in her head.

The receptionist looked up…if those two were still there with their self-important questions, she was going to stab someone.

But they'd gone, as if the very air itself had erased them from this plane of existence.


	39. The Malebolge part 1

Yep, this is going to be a two parrter as a) for the next ten days, I won't really be able to work on this and b) it's a biggie. Also, I notice we're nearly on 100 reveiws… YOU PEOPLE ROCK!

** cough **I mean thank you. Now, let's kick this off with a Dante quote…

Chapter 34: The Malebolge (part 1)

_'What's this city?' I asked the master poet._

_'You're too much taken by your visual powers,'_

_Said he, 'for what you see is an optical_

_Illusion, caused by looking from afar._

_Wait for the close up;_

_It's incredible.'_

- _Dante's Inferno, Canto XXXI_

Even before he'd opened his eyes Jobe already had a pretty good idea of what would meet them. The wailing sound that had been threatening to drive him utterly mad with its high screeching tone had abruptly cut off, taking the rest of the humdrum of hectic voices with it. It was as if some higher being had simply pulled the plug on the hospital, plunging it into perpetual silence.

"Oh crap…"

From the delicate observation that escaped Grace's lips, he guessed he'd been right, and it was with a sigh that Jobe braved himself to yank back his thin lids.

It was just as he'd expected.

Grace, on the other hand was having a harder time swallowing the rapid metamorphisms the once pristine lobby had undergone. First off, it was completely empty save for her and Jobe. To some extent, even the air had gone, replaces by some empty, formless substance that could just support the two lone people who were unfortunate enough to be standing in the twisted room, filling their lungs with a staleness that made you want to retch.

But the change in air was paled by the visual warp that had twisted the room. Grace was aware of how her canvas shoes squelched against the moist floor as she took a step back, much like an appreciator of art who tries to gain a wider scope of whatever painted masterpiece they are surveying. However, what Grace saw was no idyllic scene.

"What the hell happened to this place?"

The first thing that popped into her head was that somehow, the countless diseases housed in the hospital had managed to break free of their human incubators and ravaging everything insight before turning on the building that once stood against them. Well, it sure as hell had succeeded in corrupting the once sterile structure…

Skin, or something like it had sprouted spasmodically from between the cracks of the now filthy tiles, leaving no surface untouched by the paper-thin membrane. Tables, computes, even the line of hardy plastic chairs that had once stood so proud had been tainted by this growth, the 'skin' twisting tautly around them so hard that its all consuming grip threatened to break the imamate captive apart. Even the long, neon lights had been coated, the light filtering through a sickly yellow.

Grace broke her gaze with the nauseating scenery, her eyes only just noting how the living organ that had consumed the hospital had begun crawling over the edge of her shoe, at the sound of the automated doors wheezing open.

Jobe glanced over his shoulders, but the twin panels had already begun sliding back into place, crackling as they struggled against the skin that had even managed to root itself in the door's joints.

"Someone just go out?" He hazarded a guess for the air beyond the glass panels had turned inky black. Day, it seemed, had chosen not to follow them to this other side.

"I don't care if they did, lets just get out of this place…"

Jobe felt something to constrict around his own shoe.

"Good idea."

8 8 8

"Hey!" Jobe shouted into the dark, damp air, already closing in on the figure that had coaxed them out of the hospital.

They stopped, a head of short, blond and dishevelled hair shooting up like a startled rabbit's, the limp form straddled around their shoulders slipping.

Grace took a step forward and stopped, her jaw clucking open for the heavy load the stranger was trying to lug off into the darkness was horribly familiar.

It was Virgil, but she wasn't as nearly as lively as the last time they saw her. In fact, she looked pretty much dead to the rest of the world.

The stranger's partially visible eye shot wide, as if some buzzing drug had been dumped into her system and had bit down on her nerves. With a muffled yelp, they began shuffling back off into the blackness that had snared the hospital.

"Wait! Stop!" Jobe took off after the rapidly melting figure, his thrashing heart beginning to sink when he realised that they donned one of those sickly green costumes that only the ill and insane would be forced to wear.

The patient tripped, her leg finally crumpling under the exhausting weight that she'd been trying to keep alive for what felt like so long. It showed its thanks by dragging her down into the dirt with it. Jobe trotted to a stop, whatching with brows in a raised knot as the patient wriggled out from the disturbingly still body of Virgil and proved what a persistent little soul she was as she tried to scoop up the girl in underfeed arms.

"What did you do to her?!"

She said something, but the garble of rushed words weren't intended for Jobe's ears...or anyone else's.

"…monsters everywhere…not going to take me back…not going to…"

She mindlessly acknowledged that there was no way she was going to be able to fit the girl around her shoulder's again, so like some primal-minded ant she grabbed the nearest limb and began to drag the unconscious Virgil (at least that was what Jobe hoped) behind her like some grossly over-sized rag doll.

"Let her GO!" Jobe clamped a hand down on the woman's shoulders and he could practically hear the component that had spurred her on short circut. She stood rooted to the spot and her head began to turn o so very slowly, those hediously wide eyes gradualy coming to rest on him. In the split second before she screamed in his face for all she was worth, he got a glimps at the woman's broken visage. Malnourished skin was pulled tightly around her skull, darkening to an off brown in the hollows that nested those staring eyes, the surface of the dull orbs pink with veins. Even through the straggly, thin curtain of graying hair he could see the one emotion that those blood shot eyes possessed.

Fear, pure, animalistic fear.

The patient wheeled away from Jobe, forgetting all about the girl she'd been so intent on saving as she yelled a rush of noise that the man could not even begging to translate. She came to a stop, blasting one final, petrified glare at the man as if he was the most hedious deformity to ever grace the face of earth. Sure, he must look like hell after being dragged through the closest thing to it, but shuerly, he didn't appere so bad to deserve a look like the one this deranged woman was regarding him with.

"Hey, we're not going to-"

But that was all the sickly woman was prepared to listen to, flinging herself into the darkness, letting it swallow her whole as she threw herself to its mercy. Effortlessly, it absorbed her, along with any trace of sound that lingered behinde. In a matter of seconds, she may never have existed at all.

"What the hell was that?" Grace asked, squinting at the darkness as she caught up with Jobe, the man already bent over the discarded Virgil. He breathed a great sigh of relief at the revelation that she was still breathing.

"I have no idea…"

_We have missed out on the catalyst of this scene through our loyalty to both Jobe and Grace. For a moment, we shall leave them to drag the unconscious body of the closest thing to a friend either have left and look back, for like the twisted logic that rules this 'other side', time holds no bounds over us._

_Let us retrace the lumbering steps of that disturbed patient to the hospital and go back to the final moments of the previous evening and see if we can make any sense of what just happened here…_

Michale Drake peeked over the polystyrene rim of the chewed, polostyrine cup, not really tasting the uninspiring beverage that posed as coffee that sloshed with in it, for his attention was far too fixed on the small clock at the other end of the lounge. Five to twelve…

He sighed, for at the stroke of midnight he would have to revert back to the role of doctor and leave behinde the comfortable warmth of the staff room, starting yet another shift of wondering the sterile, facless halls of the hospital.

_'A real Cinderella, huh?'_ He though morbidly to himself, but was helpless to stop a momentary grin to spread across his face at the somewhat buzzard mental image that came to life before his mind's eye.

_'God, if they knew what was going on in your head, they'd probably throw you in with the rest of them…'_

He looked over the rim, dully noting just how much of his precious time he'd squandered in that pointless meditation…

…only to find himself staring into a pair of dark eyes.

"BOO!"

"Jesus!" He squealed at the shock from both that and the hot bite of coffee as it spilt, seeping verociously into the white jacket compulsory for all the doctors to wear.

The owner of the eyes laughed as Dr. Drake desperately tried to dab the muddy stain from his chest and failed misrebly as the coffee decided it enjoyed this new, once pristine habitat far more that the cup it had just escaped.

"Hahaha, you're a real joker."

"You know it!" The new comer shot back, not waiting for an invite to sit down. Even if he'd been told not to, Drake doubted that Dr. Whittle would comply any way… all part of that fantastic sense of humor, wouldn't you know?

Seeing that he was ulitmatly going to lose the war with the coffee stain that now proudly made its existence horribly clear on the front of his jacket, the doctor sighed. He might as well make conversation with his co-worker, who knows, he may get carried away and accidentally let his break streach out another few minuets…and wouldn't that be a crying shame.

"Say…What was all that noise earlier this evening?"

Whittle let out a bray of harsh laughter, flashing his disgustingly perfect teeth for all the world to see.

"That, my friend, was the arrival of our newest patient!"

Drake brows knitted together.

"All that noise was just one person?" At the time, he'd been just beyond the entrance hall, but even from there, it sounded as though they were re-enacting 'Cluster's Last Stand' in the lobby, compleat with cavalry and rifles.

"Heh, I wouldn't blame ya, 'Miss Crisp', as we like to call her, was dragged in by two cops and by the looks of them, she'd already had a go at one." Whittle lounged back into his seat, grinning smugly. "It took about five orderlies to get her down stairs."

"Miss Crisp?" Drake echoed somewhat stupidly. The name this mysterious patient shad been dubbed stuck out at him like a blaring, neon light from the mass of words that spewed from the dark skinned docter's mouth.

"Well, let's put it this way. One look at her and you'd think twice before falling asleep with a lit ciggerett in your hand."

Seeing that he wasn't going to get a single laugh from the man (who seemed to have the sense of humor of a hernia), Whittle launched on.

"Seriously though…" The comedy in his tone dwindled and the loud, trademark voice dimmed to a whisper. "From what we saw, that girl shouldn't even be alive."

"What you saw?"

God was he going to repeat everything he said?

"She wasn't exactly comfortable with us trying to examine her. You can ask the ordely she bit."

Drake's eyes when wide. The orderlies were a tough, formidable crew of hardened mercianries and only someone particularly wrathful was ever allowed to land a blow. Or a set of teeth.

"So what did you do with her?"

"What we always do with anyone that psycho, which she clearly was. Pump them full of Valium and let them to cool down somewhere they can't hurt themselves…" The man's overly bright eyes danced over to the clock. "…And by the looks of thing, you're going to get to meet her. Lucky boy."

Drake startled, snapping from the fuzzy state of concentration his mind had accidentally slid into while being blasted by the overload of his temporary companion's assault of words.

"Huh?"

Whittle laughed.

"It's twelve o five. You're late, buddy."

8 8 8

"gggggrrrAAAAAAAGH!"

_Thud_

Angela hit the white, yet surprisingly soft floor.

"GET IT OFF!" But no one in the dark room heard the scream of anguish, for the girl was completely alone...

…Except for the smothering embrace of the straight jacket they'd wrapped her up in like some explosive present, its claustrophobic hug constantly fighting her every movement. For a brief handful of seconds, she lay still, feeling the panic swelling up inside her like some insane, out of control cancer that no amount of chemotherapy could ever check. The sound of her frantic breathing bounced off the four, equal walls but the sound suddenly cut as it was interrupted by yet another fretful roar, born from the maddening mixture of frustration and fear as the girl tried to fight against the confiding garment.

The outcome of the short battle was the same as it always had been for the last twenty minuets, the straight jacket claiming yet another victory over its captive.

Something of a desolate sob escaped Virgil's lips as she hit her head into the floor, her hair sticking to the salty film of sweat that had congealed on her forehead.

Frustration… it burnt her worse than any flame ever could.

"Just get it off me…" The voice came again, though this time the voice sounded very, very small, almost as if the girl had come to accept that none was going to acknowledge her desperate pleas. After all, none had ever heard them before, why should they hear them now…

'Trapped…' 

Angela shut her eyes and drew into herself, trying desperately to forget where she was.

"Need a hand?"

Her head snapped up, milky eyes scanning the dark interior of her prisons. There was someone in here with her…

The girl shuffled back from the shaded silloet that had solidified from nowhere before her, trying to pick up on any detail exposed in what little light there was.

"Man, you were always so jumpy…"

She stopped, her back gently pressing into one of the idistuishable walls. There was something so familiar about that voice and her memory raced back to a tone she'd heard so long ago and thought she'd never hear again.

Her brother's.

"Dale?" Virgil's voice didn't rise above a whisper but anyone could hear the tinge of curious happiness that tainted it.

The figure crouched down, some of their features slipping free from the veil of shadows that clouded the room, and Angela saw that it was indeed he. Even from the few stay beams of light that had managed to slip in under the door, most people would be able to see the similarity between the boy and the un-burnt image of his sister we saw Jobe exchange a few bear words with.

"How did- what are you doing-"

"Shhhh." The room's newest inhabitant raised a finger to his lips, their corners raised in a smile but there was something omisinant about it and it didn't suit the boy's rounded face. "I'm not here to talk about that…"

Angela frowned. Something wasn't right.

"Then," She rasped, her voice grating painfully. "What are you here for?" The alarm bells suddenly kicked into life. Was there any plausible theory that could explain her brother's miraculous appearance?

Dale rose from his squat, comfortably sliding into the darkness like a tailored made suit.

"I'm here to talk about you. Do you have any idea how I felt when read about what happened, what you did to him?"

Angela said nothing, pressing her self into the wall that little bit harder in hope it would swallow her up. She didn't want to talk about that, especially with this _thing_ that posed as her brother. Sure, it may talk like him, mirror all his movements and even breath the same patterns but it wasn't Dale. Not by a long shot.

"Oh, so you're just going to say nothing, huh? Like you always did?"

The shadow leapt back, narrowly dodging the gnashing teeth of the girl as she erupted up from the floor and lunged at him. His words had found the big, red button and gave it one hell of press.

She staggered, catching her distorted balance.

"What about what he did to me? Did you even know the things he put me through?"

Pause.

"Of course I did."

Angela froze, her body stiff with shock. Had she just heard him correctly?

"I had my suspicions for a long time, Angela." His voice caught in his throat, but the words were void of remorse. They were filled with disgust. "Do you know what it's like to watch a friend die?"

Virgil said nothing, her face still wearing the mask of growing horror. How?

"Because that's what I had to do. Jesus, every morning I'd look at you and ask myself what you had left inside? You just withdrew from the world…it was like you were hollow, a ghost or something, not a person…"

'I think I'm going to be sick…' 

"…Not my sister, and I always wondered why you flipped out like that…" He trailed off, his eyes tracing the uniform lines of the padded walls. "Until I saw for my self."

The girl's eyes went wide, for that last sentence charged through her body like a thousand volts of electricity.

"What?" The dry word wilted even before it escaped the confines of her mouth.

"I was coming home from a friend's or something. You guys weren't expecting me home for another hour or something and I… I…" He choked, a hideous, heart wrenching noise. God, this thing even cried like her brother. "Saw you two…"

No details were needed. These curt few words said enough, leaving Virgil with the sensation as though the floor had just given way beneath her.

"After that...it was just so obvious, and I kept on asking myself how I couldn't have noticed it before… and that was when I realised that almost everyone else knew what was going on as well."

"What?"

Dale let out a mirthless shot of laughter.

"Didn't you notice the way people looked at us like we were some kind of freaks? The whole goddamn town caught on long before I ever did!"

"But…" Angela stammered. This was all too much for her brain to handle; the grey organ felt like it was about to explode within her skull. "If you knew, why didn't you do anything?"

Dale dropped his head, slipping just that little further back into the shadows that had born him.

"I…" The words caught in his throat like thick tar. "I was afraid."

If it weren't for the coarse straight jacket the girl had been manhandled into, she surely would have leapt upon this manifestation of her sibling that had spawned itself from memory and ripped it limb from limb. However, thanks to the jacket, all she could manage was a hollow echo of his closing word, trying to hold herself together as her veins throbbed with hot rage.

"Afraid?!" That was so rich; did this thing happen to share her brother's terrible sense of humour and comic timing along with every other trait it had mimicked so perfectly?

"Oh come on, Angela! What could I do? Rat on him and risk losing the only family and security we had left? Hell, maybe I should have confronted him and won myself a long trip to the hospital for my efforts!"

He sighed bitterly.

"I thought maybe if I just ignored it, it would go away, but it never did. So I left. I just couldn't take it any more. It was making me sick, just looking at you and knowing made me want to die."

"So… That's why you left?" A tremor grabbed Angela, shaking the girl as if she were ill. Anger wilted, giving way to hopeless depression. The girl dropped her head, in hope that this familiar apparition wouldn't see the tear that escaped from the corner of her eye, for now, she was able to embrace the painful, irrefutable "Because you were ashamed?"

"Yes." Came the flat answer, the empty word crushing into the girl.

"I'm sorry…" She looked up, but the shadow had gone, crawling back into whatever part of her fractured mind had summoned it into existence, leaving her utterly alone again.

But then, hadn't she always been?

Angela would have contemplated on this though if it hadn't been for the click of a key snapping the lock to her room open.

A/N: We'll be getting on to the freaky stuff next instalment.

Rodarian, I appologise profoundly for the spellings and things didn't really pick up in this chapter… and Kaiyun, I'm honered I could be of service.


	40. The Malebolge part 2

And here's the conclution to this super long chapter… and I really felt I could have done better when it came to exacuting it. I don't know, around the midway point I think I really lost it and it's been tormenting me ever since. A thanks to beethoven's moonlight sonata. I think I may have gone completely insane before I finished writing this without it. Oh, and check out EPO's new fic, tis very, very good stuff.

I'll be quite now.

Chapter 34: The Malebolge (part 2)

_'Okayyyyyy…'_

Doctor Drake stopped, blinking stupidly as he stated into the solid black rectangle that lay behind the heavy door he'd pulled open. He'd jumped, almost expecting the lightless air to reach out and grab him, ripping him from the ground he stood upon, but the darkness did nothing but stared back. A combination of lack of sleep, overdosing on coffee in hope of making up for it and dealing with the criminally insane on a daily basis tends to make those more sensitive souls a little on the edgy side, and Drake was no exception to the rule.

_'Someone left the light off…'_ The little voice that occupied the doc's head piped, stating the painfully obvious as his hand scurried over the wall to the little light switch.

'click'

Harsh, stark light flooded the small, featureless room, pouring relentlessly in from the ceiling. Drake squinted, trying to stop the bright, white glare that seemed to radiate from every inch of the room frying his eyeballs in their very sockets.

Well, almost every inch…

Something twitched in the corner.

Michel's (still stinging) eyes fell upon the small ball of curled up wreck of a human that had buried itself between the two walls.

_'So this must be the infamous 'miss Crisp' Whittle was harping on about…' _Drake mused, but the longer he analysed the lone occupant of the room, the more his 'friend's' story stuck in his throat. How could this scrawny girl cause all that chaos in the entrance hall? She looked… well… so pathetic.

The dark mess of greasy hair shifted, lifting up from the crossed folds of her bonded arms, a cloudy, grey eye languidly falling on the doctor. It barely seemed to be able to acknowledge his existence, but something in the blank gaze set the man's teeth on edge.

Drake suddenly thought back to the time when he'd been very, very small, to a time when the thought of working in a loony bin (but you could never use the 'l' word here, politically incorrect, ya know?) would have made him laugh so hard, he would have given himself a stitch. This excuse of a girl all scrunched up before him reminded him of a cat he'd once found in the dark recesses of the shed just beyond his house, lying in a bed of dust clotted with its own mess. The poor, wretched creature had been on the brink of death, thanks to a piece of metal that had managed to embed itself in its chest and was leeching the very life from it. The young Drake had approached the broken creature with only the best intentions at heart, but the second his hand had crossed into the dying creature's personal space, it sprung back into life and nearly removed the boy's hand in the process. Maybe it didn't appreciate what he was trying to do, or maybe it just wanted to die with a shred of dignity still intact.

Drake sensed that underneath this placid and not entirely 'with it' visage, there was something much darker that would lash out with far less mercy than that cat if anyone even attempted to approach her, and Drake could just jump with joy at the fact that this job fell to him.

"Miss Orosco?"

No response came from the girl.

"Miss Orosco?" Michel tried again but actually putting a little effort in this time, but was still not rewarded with even a hint of acknowledgement.

"Angela!?"

"Huh?" The girl twitched, snapping out of whatever brain dead state of mind she'd subsumed to. Her face turned up to his and in that moment, he stopped, suddenly rooted to the spot as if an army of invisible tendrils had sprouted through the floor, ensnaring his feet.

"I…"

The hospital had its fair share of burn victims but he'd never, not in all his years of being a doctor seen anything on par with this but just as his eyes grew accustom to these warped features, her head ducked back into the crook of her folded arms.

"…I just have to ask you a few questions. Do you mind?"

Nothing. Looks like that was the closest thing to a conversation he was going to get out of this particular patient.

"Is there really a choice?"

Eureka. This had to be something of a breakthrough despite how negative the croaky voice sounded.

"I'm afraid you do, hospital policy, wouldn't you know."

"…Sorry"

Angela stole a glance from between the rills of the canvas jacket as the doctor took a few tentive steps towards her, pen and note board at the ready and poised to scribble down anything to damn her to this room for the rest of her natural life. If she said nothing, they'd keep her here, but on the other side of the penny, if she said too much, they'd keep her here.

Talk about a catch twenty-two.

"Now, if I'm not mistaken, you were found on the outskirts of Silent Hill. Is that information correct?"

"yes…" Oh god, from that one worded answer, he was already scratching out lengthy notes. She was never going to get out of here during her natural lifetime if he kept going at this rate.

"I see…" Drake looked up from what Virgil estimated was half a page of condemning text. "Were you living there?"

She nodded, but this seemed to supply him with all the more to write about…

"For how long?"

The girl shifted uncomfortably.

"Two years? I-I don't really know…"

"And while you were there, you didn't happen to experience anything of a paranormal nature?"

Virgil hadn't meant to laugh, but she really hadn't seen that one coming. The doctor looked up at her for the first time since that initial, awkward glance. She quickly stopped, trying to work out if there was anyway she could kick herself without him noticing it and making a note of her 'self harming nature'. Not that she was into all that. Ha.

"No… why would you ask that?" Wow, that even sounded painful forced but the girl breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the doctor lay his o so very busy pen to rest on the clip board. No more note taking for the moment then, it seemed.

"I'll be honest with you, you're not the first person we've had from that town who's been emitted here. There have been scores of people like you, hell I think we even have a cop from these parts, who've come in here raving about monsters, fog and gods. All of that can't be coincidence, so we're embarking on a study into-" But whatever it was these fine men of medicine were going to be examining was lost as the room suddenly fell into darkness.

"What the hell?" In the pitch black that had been thrown over them like some blanket, Angela listened to the sounds of frantic movement as her interrogator made towards the door, feet scuffing against the padded floor. "Something must have blown a fuse…" He muttered, trying to reassure himself more than the girl as he strained the minute muscles in his eyes, trying to get them to adjust to the sudden dark as he blindly stumbled towards the door. Where the hell was it? He couldn't see a damn thing, surely he should have hit into a wall by now…Had the room suddenly grown, stretching out into it's dark, endless borders in the absence of light?

_'Don't be an idiot.'_

But then, as if by magic, there was light, he white beam coming tumbling through the one exit that Drake had been hunting so desperately for. The man froze, blinking like a deer caught in headlights as his pupils shrunk to pin heads, trying to shut out the sudden flare.

Someone stood silhouetted in the rectangular frame, black as black on their white background.

Angela squinted, whishing she could see at least something in the sudden haze that singed her optic nerves, but she could still hear perfectly fine as her ears caught onto the doctor's rising voice, its clam tone barely covering for the cracking hysteria it tied to mask.

"Whittle? Is that you, damn it, what the hell is going on? The light are on the fritz and-"

"I'm sorry to have to interrupt you like this, buddy," The new arrivals voice cut in the smug tones identifying it unmistakably as Whittle, effortlessly slipping like a sheet of cold ice over Drake's panicky jumble of words. "But Miss. Orosco doesn't belong here."

"Huh?" For a brief tick of time, Michael let the act he was in some degree of control drop as his brain tried to compute what Whittle had said. It didn't gel, not by any stretch of the imagination, and this particular man's behaviour (which seemed even more bizarre than usual, if such a thing was humanly possible) was threatening to drive him to distraction.

"What the hell is that meant to mean? We haven't had time to even annualise her."

Angela was dragged up from the hopeless heap she'd collapsed into, yanked by the rough collar of the jacket by growing curiosity, hand in hand with a slowly growing sense of dread. Something wasn't right, she could practically feel the bad vibes pulsate through the air like seismic waves as the silence between the increasingly irritable Drake and Whittle grew.

"Believe it or not, she has more pressing engagements else where…"

"Is this meant to be one of your jokes!? I really don't have the-"

_'CRACK'_

The outline of Drake jerked, going oddly ridged as his rant disintegrated into a wet splutter but Whittle seemed oblivious to Michael's loss of speech, his own voice rising over the gargling chokes.

"Things are finally coming together and it is crucial that she is returned to Silent Hill a.s.a.p. And, I'm afraid that it is we who do not have time for you."

Something bubbled on Drake's lips, but that was the best comeback he could offer, and as Virgil shifted to get a better view of the two, she saw the reason why.

And it would have been enough to make most people scream.

Whittle's fore arm shot out from his body, disappearing into the shadows of Drake's oddly dark chest, the unnaturally white coat seemed to have lost it's pristine sheen. At first the girl had put it down to a trick of the light, but that didn't explain where the rest of Whittle's hand seemed to have vanished to, or the reason why that dark patch of shadow appeared to be spreading out from that point.

However, when the answer to both those questions finally came, struck home with disturbing clarity.

That black stain wasn't a shadow and the reason why Whittle's hand seemed to have slipped from sight was because it was buried deep in Drake's stomach.

His elbow twitched, ripping his bloodied hand free of the warm, living cavity it had created.

"….oh….god…." Was all Drake managed through clenched teeth, a sliver of blood and saliva dribbling through them as he watched the limb tare itself free of his body. He cast one last glace at the girl he would never have the chance to help and wondered if he would have even be able to anyway before he collapsed, sinking into the white sea of floor and letting it absolve him completely as his legs forgot how to function, the nerves controlling them turning off one by one.

That scared face, twisted in confusion was the last thing his eyes would ever see.

"Man, he had to be the most serious person to ever grace god's green earth. I think hell would happily accommodate Eskimos before he learnt how to have a good laugh…"

Angela snapped her eyes of Drake's still warm corpse, the wide orbs locking on the shadowed figure towering over his fallen body, contemplating their gory hand. In the thick darkness of the room, it looked oddly out of proportion, but somehow, Virgil doubted it was a trick of the light.

"But for all his professionalism, he would never be able to ask you the truly vital question…" It trailed of, letting the hand with its weird, elongated fingers that looked so very brittle slink back into the shadows as it fell to his side. Even before Whittle lifted his head from his fallen peer, Angela already knew that the town had sought her out, for it missed its own. When the light caught the doctor's features as his face turned to hers, what she saw was enough to silence the final whispers of the tiny voice of hope that begged it not to be so.

His face was gone, the light catching nothing but a smooth surface as if someone had let his dark flesh grow wildly out of control, smothering each and every feature.

Save the mouth.

"Why do you fight us? Why do you insist on running away? Are you really as a afraid of the inevitable as you look?"

She bleated, the sound that escaped her mouth reeking of fear as she shuffled back, trying to get away from this walking obscenity, but of course, this room wasn't designed to let people run away and the straight jacket's soul perpus was to render her harmless. There was nothing she could do and she knew it. So did the doctor, and those lonely lips pulled themselves into a malicious little grin as he took a step towards her, growing wider and wider. They rode up, skin wrinkling as they parted to reveal those horridly white teeth that had multiplied like bacteria since the last time we made their aquatince. Yet still the lips parted, the corners of his mouth going taught as slowly the mouth grew past the point where his nose should have been, up past the halfway point of his face.

"Now, now, don't look so scared." The crinkled mask of skin rippled as it smiled that obscene and monstrous smirk, the horde of teeth jumping as he laughed. Those long, delicate fingers by his side sprung back into life, creeping into his pocket as he spoke. "After all, I'm not here to hurt you, just to take you home…" The spider like hand crawled from the folds of his coat, clutching something in its tangled mass of fingers. "Where you belong," Angela's eyes went wide when the light caught the hypodermic needle's pin-like shaft, the metal winking maliciously at her from the dark. "Where you've always belonged…"

The words had barely died on his lips, coming to a hissing close before his other hand sprung at her, the long fingers probing the air for anything to snare in their long web of digits. She swerved beyond them, ducking under the warped arm that seemed to be as elongated as the fingers it branched into, diving suicidaly for the other side of the room.

But the thing called Whittle had seen that one coming from a long way off.

He jerked his leg out, clipping the girl's own as she blundered past. With a yell, she tipped forward; helpless to pull herself back with arms pinned to her side and fell past the point of no return. Virgil ploughed gracelessly into the floor, crashing into it like a beakless freight train. The air cracked out of her and she lay there gasping, trying to work out which way was up in the darkness as Whittle laughed on, the vindictive sound flooding every inch the tiny room with its infectious madness.

She lifted her head, something lukewarm and wet clinging to her cheek as her head rose from the ground, tracing down the odd texture of her burnt skin as she looked up. A thin vein of moisture found its way to the corner of her mouth and pierced through her sealed lips, revealing its metallic tell-tail flavour to the girl as it swam over her tongue. The crumpled form of the fallen Drake swam into focus and filled her vision, removing any doubts over the liquid's red identity.

A shuffle behind her reminded Angela why she'd been trying to run and how sitting here contemplating the tang of Drake's spilt blood was severally cutting chunks out of her life span.

The memory of those dagger like fingers buried within Drake's chest was all it took to kick start her back into life.

She made to move, shifting up from the tangles of Drake's now red coat but that was as much of an escape she managed to make before Whittle's gross hand slammed into the centre of her back, pinning her back to the ground as he let his nails pierce the thick fabric of the jacket.

Virgil thrived, kicking wildly in the air in vain hope of hitting her assailant but he shifted out of reach, digging his knee into her spin, grinding it into her vertebra as he endeavoured to hold her still without losing the syringe grasped in the hand that wore a glove of blood. His other hand found the back of her neck and clamped it in vice like grip, forcing her head back into the puddle of blood. Ignoring the bubbling cries of protest, he held the injection aloft, admiring the way the dark liquid sloshed in its glass container before plunging it into his captive arm. The sound she made was just to die for.

"ARRRGH" Virgil arched, trying to get anywhere else but here as the long nose of metal bit into her arm, shattering the nerve it punctured. She opened her eyes, looking for some way of escape.

The was when she saw the pen that Drake had once used so generously lying only inches from her face, framed by its owner's own blood.

The makings of a plan began to formulate, but these were cut short as Whittle's thumb slammed down on the needle's plunger, depositing the thick concoction directly into her blood stream. She hollered again, her veins feeling as though they were nothing but tubes of ice as the mixture crept through them and the who limb turned numb and lifeless. Desperate eyes fell back on the pen… If she was going to do something, it was going to have to be soon, already her body had begun to turn against her as the contence of the syringe pumped its way around her system.

Angela shuddered as her tongue dipped into the pool of blood, the tang of the once warm fluid made her want to heave as she wrapped it around the stainless steel pen, drawing it in towards her mouth.

"There, isn't that better?" Whittle cooed, shifting off the now still girl. He rolled her over, scooping her up in those bizarre arms as he worked on picking her up. This was going to be-

His train of though came to a crashing halt as he found himself staring into a pair of wide, black eyes that glared up at his faceless features. He dropped his gaze and was caught on the pointed tip of the fountain pen clutched between her teeth; her mouth pulled back in a vindictive grin that was an odd parody of the one he'd been wearing only moments before.

"Wha-"

She turned her head, rocking it back as she took aim and darted towards his neck, pen first. The carved nib had no problems finding its fleshy target, burrowing deep into the network of veins and arteries that were so exposed.

If Whittle had still had eyes, they surly would have gone wide with shock.

The man leapt up, fingers clutching at the metal shaft slick with his own blood, but those over long fingers just couldn't catch onto it no matter how they groped.

Angela drew herself up, resisting the temptation to collapse back onto the ground as the ground beneath dipped violently to the left. Through eyes that had lost the will to focus, blurred by whatever the hell was now circulation around her body, she saw the blurry form of Whittle bang into the wall, clutching at the pristine surface as he weakly attempted to hold himself up. However, the walls it seemed, were going to have nothing to do with this and were more than happy to let him slide down to the floor and let him paint them crimson as bloody fingers tried to find something to support themselves with.

The girl shot the man one last glance, just to make sure he wasn't going to get up before heading for the door, or at least trying to. Suddenly, walking in a straight line had become the most daunting task in the world. It felt as though some gremlin infiltrated her head and was happily playing havoc with the carefully constructed circuits that made up her brain, cross wiring anything it could lay its hands upon.

"Shhhhhiiiitttt…" She breathed, taking a dragged step towards the rectangle of light. It felt as though the floor was racing away from breathe her sloe as it sought where to land, threatening to let her trip once again, and this time, there was no way she would be getting up…

_'So this is what walking on water must feel like…'_ She mused, forcing herself to get through that …um thing that…err, what do you call it… separated two rooms.

_'Oh god, you're so fucked, you can't even thing straight' _She pulled through the doorway, trying to work out where that fresh crop of laughter had sprung from, the world around her merging into one great, incomprehensible smear of white and grey. Angela laughed all the harder when she finally realised that it was coming from her very own mouth. She was still roaring with this mad delirium when the floor rushed up to mete her as her shaking legs finally gave way.

8 8 8

"Shut UP!"

But the figure to whom the cry of protest was directed to blatantly ignored it, letting lose another high scream, threatening to tare down the four plain walls that made up the room with the shear volume of noise that hammered against them.

The patient growled, flipping onto her back, the creak of her mattress inaudible as yet another piercing cry shattered the air and glowered at the bunk above her with enough venom to burn a hole through it. It was bad enough that she had to sleep on this bed that felt as though its mattress had been stuffed with concrete, but the fact she had to share this tiny little living space with a girl who was as sociable as a howler monkey was enough to make you go crazy…

Oh wait, she already was.

After all, why else would they have thrown her in here and tossed away the key?

The patient slammed her palms over her ears, trying to bock out her roommate's blaring lullaby. If she'd had a pillow, she would have been more than happy to burry her head under it, but then, they didn't give the patients in this ward anything to rest there heads upon while they slept in case they decided they'd had enough with hospital routine and sought another way out rather than a traditional discharge. It was probably a wise decision on the hospital's behalf as well, because this particular patient would have been more that happy to take her pillow and ram in over the screaming girl face and not let up till she'd shut up once and for all.

Gritting her teeth, the woman rolled over once more. It was almost funny to think that once, long ago, she was sitting on the other side of the fence, batting for the other team, if you will. In all her time of working in the police force and making sure people like the girl above her weren't allow to taint the crop of society like a bad apple, she never once though that she'd end up behind the walls of an asylum.

Well, that was until she'd wound up in a sunny little town know to the rest of the world as Silent Hill some seventeen years ago, but Cybil Bennet though that her own name for it suited the quiet little settlement far better.

Hell.

After all, what she'd seen there had easily earned it that title and it had certainly had quite the effect on the young officer, it's talons easily raking through her fragile mind to leave very deep scars, scars deep enough to convince her colleges that the best thing for Cybil would be to lock her up in here after a number of incidents that brought her sanity into question…

_'Huh?'_

Something had changed in that brief moment that she'd shut her eyes and taken a ramble along memory lane. The screams that she'd been desperately trying to ignore from the moment the overhead light had gone out all those hours ago had finally subsided, but something in the far darkness of the hospital's labarinth-esqu hallways had taken its place.

The former cop sat up (not that the bed did anything to entice her to remain curled up on its o so comfy surface), blinking in the dark as her eyes tried to decode the mass of grey shadows that composed the room.

"Someone's out there…" The surprisingly mousy voice of the screamer rose above the rattling chucks that echoed through the room, whining so shrilly that it sounded as though the whole pipe system was about to tare itself apart, ripping itself free from its tomb of plaster. The only other time she'd heard the hospital's water system make such interesting noises was when the old boiler had been allowed to overheat by a slothful and now redundant janitor, but this was something else altogether. It was almost as if the copper pipes were wailing in, as ridiculous as it sounded, pain.

Cybil strained her ears, and sure enough, the dry, distant sound of feet clacking against the tiled floor could be clearly heard over the shrieks rumbling through the surrounding walls.

'tap tap tap'

The thump of the heavy double doors that separated the different wards echoed up a not to distant hall as whoever was roaming the empty halls barrelled through the heavy metal sheets.

'tap tap tap tap'

No doubt about it, they were drawing closer to this particular room, the gradually rising tempo of their feet slowly gestating with volume as they broke into a run.

_'Thump'_

It was in their hallway now, picking up speed…

'taptaptaptaptap'

It was moving faster now, the sound of its footfall so close together that it just merged into one, long, break less beat. What on earth could run that fast? In a matter of seconds, it would go streaking past their door as it bolted down the uniform corridor as it continued on its rampage.

And that was when something sparked in the back of Cybil's brain and the feeling of dread that flared from it was enough to make her gasp aloud, for something very bad was going to happen when that thing came upon their room.

"Hey, get away from the d-" but she didn't get a chance to finish before that thing went rumbling past, ripping the door free from its frame as it went. Cybil flinched at the sound of metal and brittle plaster snapping lose, squinting as the light from the outside world illuminated the room with spontaneity of a solar flare.

By the time she looked up, the dust was beginning to slowly settle and the door wasn't any ware to be seen, only to be replaced by a gaping, jagged hole but that wasn't the detail, that caused the patient's heart to skip a beat and thick bile to rise up in her throat.

No, the factor that was responsible for that reaction was the simple fact that her roommate had vanished, torn from the spot she'd been standing on only seconds before.

_'Maybe this is all just some nightmare…'_ Her brain pleaded, frantically employing every strategy to keep its curious body from wondering any nearer to the wide gap in the wall. _'Please, don't go out there…'_

But it wasn't working. As if in a trance, Cybil wondered towards it, the sharp chips of plaster that has sprayed through the room nibbling gently at her bare feet as she waded through the puddle of debris. It wasn't like she actually wanted to see what lay beyond the confides of her room, but felt powerless to resist its lure. Something had happened out there and there was no way she could ignore it, go back to bed, roll over and go to sleep. Now that would be crazy.

_'You don't want to see what's out there!'_ It tried again as the woman ducked through the oddly shaped exit but yet again, its advice was ignored.

However, when the woman straightened up and took in the details of her new surroundings, she suddenly found herself wishing she'd stayed inside.

For the world had gone to hell, and taken Cybil with it.

The light overhead flickered, revealing once again the hallways so very twisted features. In the spasmodic flash of pale, yellow light, it was impossible to miss the greasy smears of god knows what congealed on the tiled walls, slowly oozing between the groves of the rubber surface. Gravity, it appeared, held know sway over this living stain as it crawled sluggishly in whatever direction it pleased, collecting in the sharp angle between the wall and the ceiling. One of the veins of the tar like liquid ran across it in a crazy jagged line, collecting on the rim of one of the long overhead lights. The woman watched, mouth ajar as the oily drop grew fat before letting go and hurtling towards the floor, smashing against it in a minute shower of black rain before crawling of towards the wall and starting the whole, eternal process again.

"No…"

She took a step back, transfixed eyes not leaving that spot on the grimy, rusted floor. "It can't be…"

Oh, those words sounded so very insignificant in the moist and clammy air that weighed down on her. Every moment more she spent looking at the twisted surroundings, the harder self control had to dig its nails in to keep her from falling apart, for all those long years of therapy and 'corrective' medication had just come undone in a blink of an eye.

"YOU'RE NOT REAL!" She threw her arms over her face, clamping her eyes shut and praying that it would all just go away somehow. Oh god, it was happening all over again. Deja vu at its most malicious…

And that was when she heard the laughing come echoing from some distant corridor.

Reluctantly, she came out from the protective shell of darkness she'd been trying to hide in, letting her arms drop limply to her side. Was there someone else here with her? Cybil winced and slowly begun to make her way towards the mirthful sound that sounded so out of place in these morbid surroundings.

8 8 8

"BWHAHAHAA!"

'This….is….really….not….funny' 

But it was. Here she was, lying on the floor rendered absolutely helpless by whatever the hell it was swimming around her bloodstream, slowly cutting her off from the surrounding world. Hell, Angela couldn't even feel the floor beneath her any more and if some twisted creature that inhabited this other side came crawling up to her looking for a free lunch, she wouldn't even be able to run the necessary though processes to even try and deter it with the feeblest nudge.

Virgil tore her lids open, and sure enough, there was something towering over her, peering down from what looked like an unfathomable height from where she lay on the floor. She managed to let out one final burst of laughter before slipping into the dark depths of this drug-educed unconsciousness, eyes swimming back in their sockets.

From where she stood, Cybil watched as the girl went out with a smile on her face.

Needles to say, we can deduce what happened here, after all, this broken enforcer of the law was the same one that Jobe and Grace happened to stumble upon beyond the hospital's tainted perimeter. We already know where this part of this story is going so let us skip back to the time to which we belong for these three have a story that is still to spin out, even if most of it has been unravelled.

_As for officer Bennet? Her story has been told but let us just say that she, like so many learnt that the town of Silent Hill rarely releases those it has touched, staying with you like a bad smell that no amount of soap and water will ever purge, for they are truly are the damned. _

_Can you give me an Amen to that? _


	41. Welcome to Silent Hill, Again

Good lord, it's under four pages!

Chapter 35: Welcome to Silent Hill. Again.

It suddenly came onto Grace that this must be how a solider charged with the task of walking through a mine field must feel before each tentive step, unsure that if the next time his foot comes down, it won't be several meters away from the rest of his leg. Granted, her situation may be somewhat less lethal, but a mistake in judgement could be just as explosive. She drew a breath and took the plunge.

"Jobe?"

The man in question didn't even flinch at the sudden sound of his name as he sat hunched over the driver's wheel.

"Hmmm?"

Grace wetted her lips.

"What's going to happen when we get to Silent Hill?"

Jobe was quiet for a moment, letting the ticking of the car fill the silence.

"We're going to go to the church. I'm guessing the two people I'm wanting to see are going to be there and we're going to find out what this whole mess is about."

"And then what?"

Grace slowly looked over at Jobe under the guise that she wasn't whatching him at all. God, he looked so cold, as if someone had replaced the man she'd met all that time ago in the wreckage of a smashed truck with a figure made with stone.

"I'm going to kill them." Grace knew when he spoke those soulless words, there would be no deterring him.

From the back of the car, Vigil shifted in her enforced slumber muttering something about 'mama'.

"So why do we have to come if this is all about you trying to get even? What good is it going to do to drag us back into this mess?"

Jobe froze up, her words cutting a little deeper than intended and hitting that sensitive nerve.

"You think this is just about me?" Grace said nothing, shifting to look out the window into the darkness beyond the window that had spread through the sky like spilt ink through water. "Because it's not. They wanted you to, Grace, Virgil as well. Don't you want to find out _why_? What the hell gives them the right to do the things they did to us…" His voice dropped a decibel. "They did to me."

He was glad Grace had no more pearls of wisdom to offer on the subject. Last thing he needed was more guilt pushed upon him and he'd decided what he was going to do the moment Julia's already cold body hit the floor with that oozing, red dent in the side of her head. Nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing was going to stop him, come hell or high water.

From the back, Angela's unconscious voice rose once again. "…For wrath kills a man and envy slays a simple one…" Before falling back into incoherent muttering.

Jobe shuddered.

8 8 8

Jobe clicked the bones in his neck. Damn, did it feel good to be out of that tiny metal box that tried somewhat tragically to pass itself off as a car. All added up, they must have spent the best part of a day in there, breathing down each other's necks and chocking on their own breath.

He looked up in to the grey sky, drawing in the damp and odourless air into his lungs as he watched the swirls of fog make odd patterns in the air. Funny, he hadn't noticed when it had got light again…

"Gee, I forgot how scenic this place was." Muttered a sarcastic Grace as she clambered out of the car, casting the bleak and invisible surroundings a dark look.

"Don't worry, we won't be here for long." The man offered, eyes still trying to dig through the solid air that hung all around them. "Would you get Virgil?"

Grace didn't object, well verbally at least, as she disappeared to the other side of the car. Jobe let his eyes drop to the head of the faithful fire-axe clasped in a loose fist, it's wickedly sharp head red with rust and god knew what.

_'Are you really going to add the spilt blood of those two to all the other stuff that's on there? Can you, no, would you really be able to go as far as that?'_

They took _everything_ from me.

_'Yes, but you're not a monster…'_ for once his conscious sounded unsure of itself. _'… are you?'_

Jobe would have shot something back at the internal voice if it hadn't been for the sudden break in the silence as Angela fell from the car, hitting the sleek tarmac in an undignified heap of unresponsive limbs. Maybe Grace was right; perhaps this wasn't such a good idea after all…

The girl was already trying to get back up by the time Grace had stooped down in an attempt to get her on her feet. That wonderful sense of weightlessness that had possessed her had lifted and the sensation that had replaced it was as nowhere near as endurable.

Virgil felt as though she'd just leapt from the roof of a thirty story building, hitting the concrete below like a stone just in time to get run over by a sixteen wheeler that had been speeding along the very road she'd collided with. That wasn't including the way her head thumped with even the tiniest movement or the fact it felt as though her eyelids were made of sand paper. To put it frankly, she felt shitty. Really, really shitty. The "I don't feel so good" she whispered as Grace dragged her to her feet was a gross understatement and the woman backed away from the human thing she'd left propped against the car, whatching as Virgil fought to stay up right.

"Shit, Jobe, we can't take her with us…" There was compassion there, honest.

"I know…" He noted Grace's delicate observation with a grave scowl. Oh well, he'd been prepared for this after seeing what a state the girl had been in when they'd carried her back to the car in the drab surroundings of the hospital's drab car park. "Virgil?"

"Huh?" The girl's eyes snapped up, trying to lock onto Jobe. Wow, was it possible for his voice to really be coming from so many directions at once?

"We're close to the church, right?"

"Ehh…" She glanced up at the foggy surroundings, trying to gather any sort of sense as to where they were in the town, pushing off from the car and taking a few shaky steps into the grey air. Jobe shut his eyes and tried to repress the urge to scream when he saw the look on her face when she turned back to the two. When he heard the fateful words, "I'm really sorry, but…" It was all he could do not to fall to the ground in a fit of hysterics and beat the ground until his fists bled dry.

"We're on the wrong side of town…" Angela saw the colour drain from Grace's face, leaving her as pale as the air that floated between them and dropped her head, whishing that she had some talent in breaking bad news. "Sorry…"

"It's not your-"

"Oh man!" Grace cut into Jobe's halfhearted apology; locking her fingers in place behind her head and caught the sideways look the man gave her. "What? You think I'm going to walk all the way across town, this town, just to watch you get even with a pair of priests? We'll be dead before we even get there!" She made for the car.

"What are you doing?"

Grace's eyes snapped up from the driver's door she'd been working her way into. Virgil just stood back, numbly whatching the scene before her unfold from a safe distance. Why did everyone around her always have to end up at each other's throats?

"Doing? What does it look like I'm doing?! I'm getting the hell out of here before this place decides to turn me into someone like you!"

She might as well have slapped him, for the result was the same. Jobe stumbled back, his eyes trying to focus on something intangible as his mouth attempted to form some sort of retort. Grace watched, reaping her verbal harvest before ducking inside the car.

It left her with the sour taste of remorse and guilt in her mouth.

For all her tactlessness, the woman knew when she'd overstepped the limits of tender human emotions, and she could safely put her hand on her heart and say this was one of those times. She'd said her harsh bit and now all that there was left to do was close the car door and get out of here as fast as this old bucket of rust and metal could go.

"And where are you going to go, Grace?"

The woman looked up, but it wasn't the man, who had leapt to his own defence.

"Do you think this town's going to let you waltz out of here just like that?" Vigil leered, a half formed smile that didn't seem to know how to work properly slowly forming on her lips. Grace's arm was still, holding the door open as she watched with something bordering on horror as the girl took a painfully slow step towards the car, swaying like a poor drunk as she tried to stay upright.

_'Just shut the door and get the hell out of here.'_

"You saw what happened the last time we tried to do that. And it's going to happen again and again and again…"

_'What the hell's wrong with her?' _Grace didn't notice how she'd started to slowly shift away from the open door, trying to put as much distance between the ranting girl and herself, all the while trying to break the iron grip of Angela's eyes that had locked onto her own and stubbornly refused to let go. Something bordering on mania flitted across them.

But just as the bitter taste of fear began to crawl up the back of her throat from the pit of Grace's stomach, Virgil stopped, the menace that had filled her only seconds before suddenly evaporated from her system, leaving not a trace of itself behind. Realising that there were two sets of wide, disturbed eyes gawking at her, she quickly dropped her head and shuffled back.

"I-I'm sorry, I sh-shouldn't have said that…"

Grace just stared, dumbfounded. She turned to the dashboard, intent on turning the key in the ignition and resurrecting the car's dead engine but sudden urge to drive off into the neo-existent sunset had gone stone cold and dead. If all that was going to be waiting for her beyond the town's border was a whole world filled with mist and fog like Virgil said, she might as well stay here and go as mad as the rest of them. Cursing under her breath, Grace climbed out from the car.

Why o why did she always let herself get talked into doing the stupidest things? Oh well, it wasn't like that mattered too much anyway, for if Grace had let her eyes linger on the dashboard for a moment longer, she would have seen that the car had only enough petrol to get it three lowly miles before coming to a spluttering halt. Walking through Silent Hill with two people who were pushing the limits of human sanity (well, one at least. Angela had broken that boundary long before she'd even heard of this town) would not be fantastic experience, but somehow, I think being on a desolate stretch of highway in equally twisted and lethal surroundings all by yourself might be even worse…

Might.

8 8 8

"Um…Jobe?"

The man heard Grace but just walked on, following the rather uncertain path Angela led him by as she tripped down yet another grey road, leaning so heavily on her sheathed sword. Sure, it had houses and shops and streetlights and everything else you'd expect to find on any other street in America, but it was all a guise. It all felt so very false, like the smile on the face of a vet as he greets some miserable wreck of a pet while holding a syringe loaded with painless poison behind his back. It was all a mask hiding truly dark intentions.

_'Anyway, this can't be America. I haven't seen a single McDonald's or Starbucks the whole time I've been here.'_

"Jobe?" Her voice rose up again, brimming with uncertainty.

"What?" The man offered crisply, agitated that he'd let her drag him from the world of his own thought. Had she always been this persistent?

"Look, I know you probably aren't going to listen but I didn't mean what I said earlier."

Silence, save for the continuous tap of Virgil's kantana on the road.

Grace sighed. She'd been expecting this response but not prepared for it and the rejection hurt all the more because of it.

"I mean," She tried to find the words to carry on this failed apology. "I really can't understand how you must feel after all you've-"

He pivoted, trainers squealing as he turned on the wet tarmac. Up ahead, Virgil stopped, looking wearily over her shoulder with a sigh, wondering if Jobe was liable to solve arguments the same way Mr. Orosco had until a knife to the neck solved his aggressive tendencies.

Several meters behind, Grace found her mouth was empty, the words shrivelling up like musty, dried leaves as Jobe glowered down at her from slit eyes.

"You can't understand? Of course you can't! You can't even begin to imagine half the things they put me through!"

Grace backed into her self, wincing at how loud his voice was and how very alien it seemed in the noiseless surroundings.

"Hey, I was there to. I know-"

"You know?" He broke in, ramming her unfinished sentence back in her face. "Really? You think you know? Do you know how it feels to have to kill your best friend? To have to smash the person you love's head in? Do you know how it feels to have all those people turn on you because some arrogant bastard and witch get their kicks playing mind games…" He stopped, drawing a shaky breath from the empty air and leaving Grace just goggled up at him, dumb with shellshock. "It makes you want to just die."

He turned, leaving Grace to mull over his words as he sulked off after Angela, who was pretending pretending she hadn't heard a word of it. However, for that to be true, she would have to have been half a mile away.

AN: I would like to thank all those who have stuck through up to this point. It's been a while, huh? Is this the longest story in this section, I wonder…

E.PO- oh, there's been a whole veriaty of music that would probably be considered odd for writing something like this to.

SlapDash- Heh, I've still got a few up my sleeve. Actually, in a chapter or two, there's going to be quite a big one…


	42. We're all blind in the dark

I know the last chapter wasn't much so I hope this makes up. The short way we've still got to go may take a while because… you guessed it, I have exams, well mocks to be more pessific, coming up as well as the hedious amount of course work that's just screaming to be done.

Chapter 36: We're all blind in the dark

"You have got to be kidding me!" Jobe slapped a hand to his forehead, giving Angela an almost desperate look but the look on her face revealed that this was far from a joke. That or she had a wonderful poker face in her now slightly more conscious state.

"Please, Jobe, it'll be safer and much quicker if we go this way."

An utterly confused Grace watched as the two volleyed the potential argument between them.

"What's wrong with this way?" She piped, pointing at the heavy, rusting door Vigil had led them blindly to. The sign next to it identified it as the entrance to Silent Hill's own water treatment station.

"Last time Virgil took me down here," He started, turning to the smaller woman for the firs time since he'd vented all his woes at her. "She nearly drowned and I came very close to being eaten by this town's take on Classical mythology. Trust me, you don't want to go down there."

But Jobe left a lot unsaid, partly because he had no ideas how the put word to the feeling of utter dread that had sized him as he crawled through the tunnels of filth. How would you explain feeling as though you'd never see the sun again as the dark closed in around you, the only thing keeping it's ravenous fingers at bay was a tiny flashlight clinging to the front of your shirt that could blink out at anytime. Even a poet might not be able to express the sensations that ripped at his nerves as he'd scurried through there, praying that he could keep up with the ghost that lead him through the countless twisted corridors.

"So? You nearly got eaten up here too, but I don't see you throwing a hissy-fit to walking through town." Grace glanced at Virgil for both support and to avoid the smouldering look the man was giving her. "And if it saves time… well I don't want to be here any longer than I have to be."

Jobe sighed. He was never going to win this one with the pair of them against him. Grace's opinionated nature sure as hell made up for the submissive girl who stood hunched next to her.

'She probably wouldn't be saying this if you hadn't had a go at her earlier…' 

"Fine," He turned, stabbing a pointed finger into Grace's face as Angela began to work away at the door. "But don't you ever say I didn't warn you."

Grace just cast his finger a rather bored look.

"A-a-are you two coming?" Angela nervously broke in, peeking out from the darkness of the newly opened door.

"Sure we are." Grace chimed, give Jobe one last look before turning and walking over the grey building's threshold and into it's black interior.

Jobe sighed again, making a move to join them. God, why had he gone and put this barrier up between the rest of them? Sure, Grace had pinched a very sensitive nerve with the words she'd blurted, but that didn't deserve the retaliation she'd got from him. As for Virgil? The girl hadn't looked at him in the same way since that incident in the hospital.

And that was when the harsh slam of metal on metal shattered the silence, snapping Jobe from his meditation.

8 8 8

'**BANG**'

Angela stated, heart rocketing up into her mouth as the room suddenly tumbled into darkness.

"What the hell was that!?" Grace cried, wheeling round and coming face to face with the now firmly shut door. "How-" She started, but the creases of confusement that had begun to form on her brow fell away as Virgil barged past her.

"Jobe?" She called into the crusty metal surface, thick with coats of rust.

"What was that for?" Came the surprisingly distant voice from the other side. Even though there were only inches between the two, he sounded half a mile away.

"Hey, we didn't do anything!" Angela rolled her eyes as Grace cut in, folding her arms tightly over her chest and glowered at the man on the other side of the door. Last thing she needed was these two breaking into _another_ argument…Even though they were separated by six inches of solid steel, she wouldn't put it past them.

Virgil's hand found the handle, but she wasn't surprised when it refused to budge no matter how hard she tried to shift it.

"What the… I can't get this door open." The words that seeped through the layer of old, neglected metal didn't come as a shock either. "Can you let me in?"

The girl tried again, succeeding only in removing a layer of damaged skin as her fingers fought against the stubborn handle.

"It's stuck…"Grace commented dryly as she peered over Virgil's shoulder, not sounding to upset about the fact that her reunion with Jobe wasn't going to be happening anytime soon by the looks of things. Muttering something, the girl before her pulled something from the pocket of her worn jumper, the clothing looking just about ready to unravel into nothing but a heap of twine. Resisting the temptation to ask, Grace quietly watched as the girl stopped down, shifting through the small pile of paper squares she'd pulled from her pocket, shifting through it with a finger. Finally having managed to identify the seemingly identical scraps, she picked it out and began to unfold it into a very shabby piece of paper, complete with stains and countless creases that crept over its flimsy surface like a network of veins.

Grace couldn't contain it anymore.

"What are those?"

"Maps." Came the monosyllabic answer as the hunched girl posted her find under the crack of the door.

8 8 8

Jobe straightened up, looking somewhat quizzically at what he held in his hand. She'd already given him one of these so what was the point-

Wait, this one was different. For a start it only showed a small area of the town and it was in far more detail that the larger one.

"What am I meant to do with this?"

"Just go to Saunders Street. There'll be a-a-a building like this on it that you can access the sewers from. Can we meet you there?" He glanced down at the map in his hands. Well, at least it wasn't too far. How much could go wrong in the time it took him to navigate his way there.

Jobe tried not to listen to the little voice that coolly whispered in his ear that he'd just gone and tempted fate.

8 8 8

Grace shuddered. They'd only been trudging through this place for what? Five, six minuets and already she felt like grabbing her hair in her fists and screaming until she was horse. No matter where you looked, there'd be another wall closing tightly in on you, happy to crush you with claustrophobia. Thank god years of smoking had dampened her sense of smell and she was at least saved from having to inhale the full reek of this place. What little she did manage to pick up was enough to make her heave.

"How long until we get there?"

Angela sighed, all to able to hear how the woman's voice cracked, raw panic oozing between the broken lines as she stumbled so close behind her, practically scraping the skin off Virgil's now bear feet with her shoes.

"I think we're nearly there…" She squitinted, pale eyes trying to pierce the invisible shapes that lurked up ahead, scanning for something that stood out against the dark. "Ah, see, all we have to do is go down that service ladder and we're there." She could practically fee the tension let lose its grip on Grace.

"Well, thank god for that. I thought we were going to be down here…" They came to a halt over the round hole in the ground, breaking the pattern of filthy tiles and nameless filth tickling over them. However, when Grace peered into that unblinking eye of black she instantly forgot the one word that was needed to complete her hanging sentence.

"Um, Virgil?" She glanced up at the girl as her stomach started to crawl with sick dread. Where's the ladder?"

Angela had been asking herself the same question. Here was the shaft they needed to take but the familiar iron ladder had, quite simply, vanished. From the raised heap of cracked tiles that lay around the circumference of the manhole in no chaotic order, it looked as though someone had ripped the structure free from the ground, letting it tumble into the dark void below.

Grace, unable to even try and think what was going to happen now, reached for the faithful pack of cigarettes that had accompanied her for the whole of this journey. There had been only one route for them to take while they were down here and now the only two exits had been cut off from them.

"This is bad…" She shuddered, nibbling furiously on the butt of the paper cylinder clutched between her worrying teeth. As she reached for the lighter, that one word came floating back to her, finishing the ultimate sentence.

_Forever…_

"Shit, this is bad…" Her hand tremored as it tried to light the shaking tip of the fag, trying to ignore the countless morbid scenarios that had started playing over in her head to the sound of her heart fluttering at an insane speed.

Angela said nothing, only staring at the hole. Her foot moved out, catching the edge of a chipped tile.

"What are you-" But the girl remained silent as she pushed her find towards the black circle's mouth, her face pulled into a bizarre grin. She let the chunk of floor teetering on the cusp of the hole, prolonging its fall for only a moment before her toes let go and it tumbled into the black void.

"What was that-" Yet again, Grace was cut off as Angela raised a finger, signalling for silence for only a moment longer, lips twitching as she counted silently.

"Two…three…"

Grace had a horrible feeling she knew where this was going.

"Four-"

The sound of something hitting water came floating up the hole and Grace almost cried when Angela confirmed her suspicions by taking another step towards the edge.

"Hey," She grabbed the girl's arm, her fingers digging into the saggy jumper a little harder that she meant them to. "Quit screwing around. That _really_ isn't funny…"

Virgil turned, shooting her a confused look.

"Huh? What do you mean screwing around?"

"Well," Grace let out a nervous laugh. "You're not seriously going to jump down there, right?" The self-reassuring smile on her face was beginning to ache. "I mean, there's another way out, right?"

Angela just dropped her head, speaking her muffled reply into her chest.

"T-t-t-this tunnel, it just leads to a dead end. Sorry."

Grace practical inhaled the rest of the slowly disintegrating cigarette in one breath. The situation was rapidly going from worse to an utter nightmare and all that hysteria that she'd been holding back was beginning to break free of its confides. Virgil said nothing as the woman before her started giggling, a hideously high-pitched sound that lacked any sanity whatsoever.

"Well, I'm sorry but there's no fucking way I'm jumping down there." She folded her arms and turned her back on the girl and that horrible hole, teeth gnashing relentlessly on the end of the fag, trying desperately to find some sort of consolation.

"Grace, please-" But the girl's reply was cut off as Grace shook her head violently, sending the semi-blond pony tail into a frantic dance.

"No!"

Angela's pleading hands dropped limply to her side. Why was she so terrible when it came to arguing with words? Sure, she could beat the living daylights out of the woman in a physical fight but she would be too scared of even raising her fists against her. Anyways, that would be uncivil… but actions do speak louder than words… A grin formed on her face as the idea came onto her.

"Then, I'm sorry to have to do this…"

Grace's eyes snapped open, Virgil's words setting of her internal alarm bells. The woman turned sharply, her heels sliding over the pool of stagnant waste that ran over the ground beneath her feet in time to see Angela take another step, bringing her filthy foot over the black pit.

"WAIT!" Grace lunged forward, but it was too little, too late. The only thing her splayed fingers managed to close on was empty air as the girl lent forward, letting gravity pull her past the point of regaining balance and fell into the hole.

She fell with out a sound, swallowed effortlessly by the gapping black mouth that grinned up from the ground.

Dumb, Grace stared at the empty handful of air she desperately clung onto. Time, it seemed, had chosen to defy the laws of physics and come to a stuttering halt, not that time in Silent Hill had ever obeyed the rules that it was set to follow else where, and Grace could do nothing but stare at her fruitless pick, trapped in the moment by cold horror.

**SPLOOSH**

The woman jerked back into life as the sound of something much larger than a chunk of plaster hitting the water smashing the silence and setting the rich, pungent air alive as it echoed off the tightly packed walls. The woman breathed a sigh of relief as the sound of wet spluttering came bubbling up from the dark shaft, stepping up to the edge of the hole and peering down into its depths. She still couldn't see a damn thing.

"Virgil?!"

A voice rose from the splashing but the woman couldn't make out a word she said over the sound of the water…it all sounded so hectic…

"VIRGIL?!" Still, there was no reply save for the sound of swirling water and something struggling against it, and that was when it hit Grace bang in the frontal lobe. That horrible, semi-precognition that something very bad is about to pass, call it woman's intuition or whatever you want, but it turned Grace's blood to ice, a fever of goose bumps racing up and down her skin.

_'What the hell is going on down there?'_

A shout, a ballad of pain and rage came bursting up from the hole and the sound that was all it took to end the woman's dilemma. She was just about to crouch and arm herself with the biggest chunk of rubble she could find when-

"Hello, Grace." A voice behind her cooed softly as a hand planted itself in the middle of her back, pushing her forward and over the edge of the hole. She could do nothing but fail her arms in a pathetic attempt to get back the balance she'd already lost as she fell forward, tumbling into the darkness bellow with a scream.

8 8 8

Hitting the water had hurt. A lot. Angela had tried to scream but that only succeeded in letting a torrent of thick, black water invade her mouth, searing her tongue with its god-awful flavour. It tasted even worse than last time she'd fallen into the sewer's waters, she hadn't thought a feat like that would be physically possible.

The girl made a desperate burst for the surface, praying that in her blindness, she'd guessed that the direction she swam in truly was up. Another moment under the surface of this pool of stuff she didn't even want to hazard a guess at and she'd pass out. Even with her nose clamped tightly shut, she could still smell the unfathomable reek around her, as if it had somehow managed to infiltrate the surface of her skin.

A hand broke free, rabidly followed by the rest of the coughing, spluttering body, throwing itself towards the edge of the rancid pool. Angela thought she truly would die if she had to hang in that dark, thick 'water' a moment longer, rabidly dragging her self up on the ledge her stray hand had blindly caught.

"Virgil?!" A voice, Grace's maybe, came floating down the shaft. The already distorted sound swam in her ears, along with the nauseating residue that flooded them and the girl could only half-heartedly mumble a reply as she tried not to succumb to the overpowering stench around her.

"VIRGIL?!" The call came again. Gathering her senses as she hauled herself up onto the sleek ground, the girl opened her mouth to reply, but the only sound she managed to make was a retching scream as something lanced through her shoulder. The inhuman, living thing yanked the broken rags of cloth and skin up, ripping the girl free of the pool she'd been trying to scramble out of like a drowned rat only moments before. It's funny that salvation and damnation can switch places so very easily.

8 8 8

Jobe didn't bother with the last few rungs of the ladder, leaping free of it the moment he got close enough to the ground to jump and not break his leg. Unfortunately, in his haste, he'd forgotten that his left leg had been to some extent re-arranged by the ravenous teeth of gluttony but was quickly reminded of that minor detail as he landed on it. It was as if someone had pumped the limb full of plastic explosives and just pressed down on the big red button…

He collapsed, his cries shattering the dark as he clutched at the wound in some hopeless attempt to do something to the pain that throbbed away under his skin but no matter how hard he tried, his fingers could never reach the burning under his skin.

"Do you need a little help down zhere?"

Jobe let one clenched eye roll open, trying focus on the figure that had materialised from the shadows, looming down at him with a smile. That voice…it sounded just as happy as the first time he'd heard it.

"Get the hell away from me." Jobe growled through gritted teeth, but Casper only laughed, throwing his neatly shaven head back as he let the heartfelt sound rip.

"Oh, Jobe… You really don't look like zhe kind of man who can refuse a helping hand." He brought his head back down, gleaming at Jobe. "But I guess zhat's just zhe vay you are, eh?" His eyes narrowed as he observed how Jobe's finger's tightened on the fire-axe's slender neck but that smile never left his face, even as he brought his boot down on the busy hand, letting Jobe howl as he felt the bones in his hand shift and grind.

"Tut, tut," He drawled on, teeth pulled into an expression that would rival even the greatest white shark as Jobe tried to writhe free from the heavy shoe's vice-like grip. "Still so resistant to zhe help ve offer you. Each of our lessons, zhe message so clear it makes me vant to cry as you turn a deaf ear, unheard."

Casper lifted his shoe and started to trace a lazy circle around the downed Jobe who was too engrossed in cradling his singing hand to fully listen to the soft voice that floated up into the surrounding dark.

"So, it has fallen to me, zhe right hand of god in zhis whole affair, to open your eyes, something my superiors have failed in."

A blur of motion and a ball of livid pain ruptured in Jobe's forehead. He was barely aware of Casper snapping his foot back from the blazing point of impact, proclaiming something as his vision darkened, clouded over by the lure of unconsciousness.

"You vill see vhat you vere always meant to be, mine friend."

And Jobe knew no more.

A/N: I'm going to warn you now, the next chapter isn't going to be a barrel of laughs so get some morbid music ready…

Thankyou for reading, oh, and if you're looking for something to read in the time it takes to do it, there's a one shot floating around the Hellsing section that may amuse for a brief amount of time under the title of 'I want the sun'.

'Till the next time.


	43. A fall from grace

I know this took a long time, but i have been REALLY busy at the moment with work. I'm afraind that due to this, I'm going to put writting this on hold till mid December. Untill then, I'm going to leave you withsomething of a revelation about one of the charaters...

Chapter 37: A fall from grace

_'Is that…singing?'_ Jobe tried to lift his head as he slowly became aware of the world around him, senses drowsily coming too. There was someone singing, but he must be still be out of it for the words sounded foreign to his ears, almost…German.

_'Casper!'_

The man jerked awake, groggy brain kicking violently into focus as his mind reeled back to the details that had lead up to this current point of time. He lunged forward without any real plan but was quickly snapped back to the ground by something nipping his writs, holding them firmly behind his back.

"What the hell?!" He tried again, only managing to move a bare few centimetres before the things binding his hands yanked him back to the wall he'd awoken propped up against only seconds before. Jobe twisted his neck violently and ignored the sharp crack of bones popping out of place, the growing anxiety numbing him to the pain as his eyes frantically searched for the source of his immobility.

It didn't take long for them to find it.

A twin pair of silver rings hugged his wrists and it was with growing dread that Jobe identified them as hand cuffs, the chain holding it together warped around a greasy pipe running along the base of the wall. He jerked up again, realising that the singing that had lulled him awaked had stopped some time ago and nothing but silence rung through the dingy, damp room. Nervously, the man looked up, but what he saw was enough to shove the thought of those constricting handcuffs right to the back of his mind and out the back of his head.

"Vell, ladies, vhat do you know, it looks like he's finally awake." Casper grinned down at him, the sleek, coal black form of a gun slowly twirling around his wasted finger as he let the weapon dance in his grip. "Ve can finally get things around here going, zhe Lord in her infinite glory knows we've all been vaiting long enough." He grinned, face looming like some living jack-o-lantern in the cold light that blasted down from long, overhead light that seemed to kill all the colour of these squalid surroundings. Jobe, however, didn't notice any of this. He was to busy trying to get his over exposed mind to swallow the scene before it.

Two chairs sat further back in the room. The form of Grace was easily recognisable, strapped against the sorry, worm-eaten bit of furniture with an over generous amount of black duck tape. It ran over her arms, chest and legs making even the thought of standing up nothing more than wishful fantasy. Jobe felt a ball of lead begin to materialize in the depths of his stomach when he saw the strap of the thick sellotape slapped on her mouth but that was nothing compared to the look in her eyes when he finally caught them.

Good lord, she looked as though she was going to have the mother of all cardiac arrests and knew it. Her eyes had gone impossibly wide, the whites flashing feverishly in the stark light and in them, Jobe could see the fear that seemed to be able to so effortlessly posses anything unfortunate to wonder into this damned town. He would have given anything to be able to go to her right now, regardless of what had passed between them earlier.

Virgil didn't seem too worried about the situation compared to the woman (who looked as though her heart was about to explode within her chest any second now as she put up a pitiful fight against the tape holding her in place), eyes fixed firmly on the floor. For a moment, Jobe asked himself why the hell she was just standing on her chair and hadn't already beaten Casper to a bloody pulp by now. At least, that had been his train of thought until he'd seen the trail of rope that traced its way down from the ceiling, wrapping itself around her neck in a sickeningly tight noose. That sight was enough to cause all the questions he'd been asking himself to shatter like broken glass as the blood drained from his face.

"What in the name of god's going on?!"

Casper drew himself up, a smug grin drawn on his lips.

"Vhat in zhe name of god… yes, that is vhat this is all truly about after all, God. Not you as you've so selfishly managed to fool yourself in to believing for so very long. I'm so very glad zat you've finally come to see zhat." He turned and began to walk, still talking as he toured the confides of the small room, seemingly turning a blind eye to all the foul details like the damp that caused the wall's tiles to step out of their organized lines or the thick, black, greasy stains that adorned practically every surface.

Ah, how carefully constructed those words were, they were something to rival even the most spell binding sentence spouted by Father Parker…

Casper glanced over his shoulder to see what effect they were having on his newest captive. Needless to say, he was more than sourly disappointed when he saw that the man was more concerned with trying to snap the chain of the cuffs than listen to him.

Casper felt his lips draw tight. He had put so much effort in to this, the glorious revelation of truth, and _this _was the audience got for it? He felt his teeth grind together, listening to their whining as they slipped over one another. He was going to have to try a far more drastic approach.

Jobe cussed under his breath as he tried to snap the cuffs on the pipe that held them in place. Old they may be, but they still had a hell of a lot of life in them…

Something slid into the man's peripheral vision. He stopped his frantic work, finally looking up only to see Casper grinning ear-to-ear, Virgil's kantana slung leisurely over his shoulder. Oh, after this, he wasn't going to be looking away, no sir-y bob.

"Glad to see ve have your attention, Jobe. For a minuet, I though you didn't want to hear me out, ja?" His overly sweet words barely hid the contempt beneath them as he stepped back towards the two chairs. "Vell, I guess I just need to show you how far I'm villing to go to make sure you hear just vhat it is I have to say." He lifted the sword, aiming the hideously sharp weapon at Grace and let its tip hover dangerously close to her exposed skin and she screamed behind the tape.

"No…" Jobe gasped, whatching as Casper rose the kantana. Grace squirmed, nostrils flaring as he brought it up behind her head, wincing as he let it come to a gentle rest on her neck.

"You do anything and…I swear I'll…I'll…"

"You'll do vhat? Open your eyes, mien friend, there is nothing you can do, save listen and if you do zhat, no one has to get hurt, ja?" He grinned, letting the blade cutting a little deeper, revelling in the woman's sharp intake of breath.

'Especially after all she's done…' Casper silently added. Oh, he was going to enjoy this. 

"Please, stop!"

Casper fought the temptation to let the blade bite any further. He'd been hoping to be able to draw a little more blood than the pathetic trickle that dribbled down the shaking woman's neck.

"So do I have your undivided attention?"

"Yes!" Jobe cried, helpless to do anything else but beg. "Just please don't-"

"And you aren't going to try to escape again?"

"No!"

Jobe felt the adrenaline begin to let go of his nerves as Casper withdrew the sword from its fatal resting place, and let some of the stress that had built up in him to bursting point go in a long, shaky breath. Jobe silently prayed to a god he no longer believed existed, asking for some way out of this…this torture that didn't involve yet another person he knew being lost to the town.

"Vell, zhat is good," Casper smiled warmly, the kind of smile you'd bestow on an old friend, not someone you were pushing closer and closer to the fragile breaking point of sanity. "Because it would be such a shame to have to do something like THIS!" As he spoke the final word, the carpet of false reassurance was ripped from beneath Jobe's feet as Casper's arm shot out in a sharp arc, slamming the blade's edge across Virgil's abdomen. The girl lurched forward as it lanced her skin, gasping dryly as the serpentine rope around her neck gripped that little bit tighter. Grace jumped in her chair as if she'd been the one hit but Jobe sat motionless, staring with blank horror at the bent girl as his brain tried to catch up with the rapid turn of events. That didn't just happen, right?

The low, dragged out moan that escaped between Virgil's clenched teeth was all that was necessary to kill any hopeful doubt.

"Now, now," Casper cooed softly, placing a hand constructed of nothing but overly long bone and skin on the girl's shoulder and gently pushed her off her own sword. "Ve vouldn't vant you to fall of zat chair, now vould ve?" Virgil said nothing, the muscle under her left eye jumping as Casper righted her and left her to try and stand for herself. The anorexic-ly narrow German couldn't help but grin at the pathetic effort.

And that one grin was all it took for Jobe to snap.

"You goddamn bastard" He jumped forward, forgetting the chain binding him. "Why the hell are you doing this to us!? What did anyone of us do to you, huh?" Silence, save for the occasional stifled whimper that Virgil tried to hold in and Grace's fitful breathing.

"Vhy am I doing this?" He echoed, turning to Jobe, meeting the man's poisonous stare and let it be one of those glorious rare times in which he didn't smile. "Because your false ignorance hurts me. It is so necessary for you to acknowledge vhat it is you truly are. Zhen, vhen God is finally returned to this vorld, even those who reek of guilt and corruption can be saved…"

_'Not all this again…'_

Jobe exhaled sharply, letting his head bump against the hard wall behind him. He was so sick to death of this tune about forgotten sacred truths. There was nothing, not one element of his life that stood out as remarkable or so fantastic that it earned him a place in 'god's' service.

"Vell," Casper dropped his gaze, slowly re-tracing his steps towards Grace. "I vould be lying if I zaid zhat vas zhe whole truth. If it vas, zhen I assure you zhat mien methods vould be novhare as…extreme."

Grace saw him coming and tried to jerk the chair in any direction that put some space between them, only succeeding in getting a few measly mili-meters as the chair legs screeched in high protest. The man clapped one of his long hands down on the back of the flimsy wooden structure, firmly routing it to the spot.

"Tell me Jobe," He leered at the woman as she tried to squirm away from the him, but the tape binding her was going to have none of that. "Has zhis…" He let the word build up behind his gritted teeth, as if just holding the unformed air in his mouth was enough to make him retch. "Voman told you anything about her zelf?" Casper glanced back at Jobe over his sharp shoulder, spitting the venomous words. "Or is zhis little snake's history another truth zhat you're wondrously oblivious to?"

"What are you on about?" Jobe felt familiar frustration well within him, threatening to rip him at the seems like an overstuffed sack as he did all he could to not scream at the leering man. If it weren't for these handcuffs…

But Casper just ignored the man, turning his attention back to Grace with a melodramatic expression of shock plastered all over his bone-y face that looked as though it should only ever be found on some horrific theatrical mask rather than any organic structure.

"You mean you didn't tell him?" He gasped in mock surprised as the woman cringed against his patronising tone. "Vell!" He leapt up, leaving an utterly confused Jobe to trace him with his eyes as the man began to slowly encircle the chair like an over-sized vulture just waiting for its fading quarry to finally croak. "Seeing as zhis vas meant to be your moment of revelation, I guess a little story vouldn't hurt." He slapped a hand down on the back of Grace's head and ruffled her hair, the action treading the near invisible, thin line between violent and playful. "Who knows, maybe it will refresh your own memory and ve can all put this unpleasantness behind us."

Virgil lifted her head, forcing her pained eyes to follow Casper. The man had resumed the role of preacher as he absentmindedly allowed his feet carrying him about the room, anything to take her mind of the burning agony that was her stomach, cruelly reminding her of its searing presence with each laboured breath. If she didn't concentrate on something else, she might not be able to hold herself up for much longer. Her legs had already started shaking under what felt like an ever-growing effort to keep herself up, the muscles just begging her to let go and lose her footing…

"Once upon a time, zhere vas a little girl called Grace. Now, zhis particular little girl didn't make too much of her self, drifting aimlessly through zhe education system vithout even a drop of interest or ambition and vhen it came to being thrust out into zhe big, vide vorld, she realised she had nothing to show for herself." Casper swooped down on the woman, gripping her shoulder hard enough to turn his knuckles white and gave her a shake. "Izn't zhat right, Grace?"

But of course the woman could reply with no more than a moan, her wide eyes desperately latching onto Jobe and the man felt sick to his stomach at the painfully bare fact that he couldn't respond to their noiselessly loud screams for help. There was however, something else in the hapless gaze, and the man found his mind flitting back to the moment when Angela had begged him 'not to hate her' before leaving him alone in the fog like a lost child. The very tiny percentage of his mind that were still capable of rational thinking began to wonder just what was it she'd done to get wrapped up in this whole, infernal mess…

Casper looked down, seeing how the woman shied away from touch.

"Oh," He swung round the chair, kneeling in front of the bound Grace. "Are you ashamed?" He purred in a sickly patronising tone. "Zhe irony of you even being capable of that emotion makes me vant to laugh, for you see, Jobe," He glanced back at the man, grinning like tomorrow was an alien notion. "Vhen our little Grace discovered she had not a single talent to offer society, she decided to give it something else..."

_'I don't want to hear this.'_ Jobe saw the manic glint is his captor's eye and suddenly found that he would gladly give his own if only he could ram his fingers in his ears before Casper had a chance to utter what ever terrible truth hovered on his lips. It was then, Jobe realised he was just as scared as Grace. Perhaps when this revelation was out, it might liberate his trapped memory and he'd finally recall whatever he'd done to earn himself a place here.

_'Don't be a fool, you know you haven't done anything…'_ The voice of his conscious faltered, its once self-assured words finally failing to ring with their former confidence.

"She gave it…" Casper rose, ignoring the tears that the woman had begun to cry, perhaps in a last ditch effort to make him keep the damming information to himself. Tough shit. "Her body and flesh."

Grace mumbled something under the tape but it got lost somewhere in the heavy silence that had instantaneously flooded the room. Jobe sat utterly still as Casper's words slowly sunk in, but before he even had a chance to digest the bitter mouthful, the man was off again, happily breaking it down into small, jagged pieces that stuck in your throat.

"Zhat's right!" He gleefully turned to the lopsided Virgil. "Zhis… thing sunk so low as to sell herself to anyone with more money zhan dust in their wallet. Can you, after everything you've been through at the hands of a man, your very own fazher no less, imagine what kind of person vould revel in zinking so low?" Even through the pain, the look of sheer disgust on Angela's face was loud enough. Casper wheeled away, pleased that he'd been able to illustrate that point so nicely thanks to his silent audience. Well, he'd given Jobe enough time to come to terms with that juicy piece of information, even if he still looked like he didn't quite know what to make of it, and the show must go on if he were to make any progress today. Casper smartly clapped his hands together, snapping the chained up man from the state of disturbed meditation he'd slipped into.

"But, as heinous a sin as it is, that alone vouldn't varrant even zhe cheapest whore a place here. Grace, however, really managed to excel herself und set herself apart from zhe masses. For you see, Jobe, after oh… three years of living this wretched lifestyle, She tested positive for HIV. Not surprising, really," Casper looked back at Grace, grinning triumphantly at the tearful wreak strapped to the chair, trying desperately to find someway to fold in on herself and just crumple into nothing. "Seeing as she lived such a filthy life, it vas only right zhat she be consumed by zhe dirt zhat she would daily bathe in."

Jobe stared blankly at the woman opposite him. He would never, not in a thousand years, have guessed what was lying just under his skin. People like that… they were nobodies you briefly caught glimpses on the street corners at three o'clock in the morning, undishdiguasble flashed of worn, seductive and soulless colour that didn't seem human from the safe distance you saw them from. They weren't people you knew, least not your friend…

Casper sighed, his sad eyes catching Jobe's perplexed.

"You'd think zhat would open her eyes to how very vrong und immoral zhis vay of life vas, vouldn't you?"

Jobe said nothing, looking at a spot on the floor between his legs.

"Vell, it didn't. She'd been living in zhe dark for so long, she'd all but denounced zhe light. So, she vent on." Casper's hand crunched into a fist as his voice slowly heated. "She vent on sleeping vith men and taking zheir money vithout blinking. Zhis," He launched a finger, jabbing it vehemently at the woman. "Zhis monster said nothing! She knew zhe consequences of her actions, but still, she vent on, day after day!" Spittle had begun to fly from his snarling lips as he ranted on. "Zhe lord knows how many wayward souls she vell and truly corrupted, but I can name one." He let the air rush from his lungs, and the transformation that came over him was remarkable. In the space of a few seconds, he'd gone from launching a speech that would rival one of Hitler's insane speeches to looking smaller than ever.

"Me." The word was nothing more than a whisper but it spoke louder than anything he'd said prior. "I vas a wayvard soul who blindly wondered into zhis temptress's rotting embrace like a lost sheep who may naively seek refuge in zhe volf's den, and because of it, I have been forever marked for my sin." He let his head drop for a moment but Jobe whished he'd just carry on talking. At least then his brain wouldn't be left alone to stir the nauseating information that had just been thrust before it, and as if by magic…

"But zhen, I found zhis town und it vas here zhat I discovered a god, a god who vould truly deliver us from evil. No vone vould ever have to suffer from the evil of such sins _ever _again, for vhen she arrives, she vill re-mould zhe vorld into perfection."

Jobe shook his head.

"But what the hell does that have to do with any of us!?" He quickly found himself eye to eye with the bony man.

"You, mien friend, have zhe unparallel honour of aiding the coming of zhis paradise. You vill bear the veight of man's sins, and all it requires you to do is remember vhat it is you truly are." He smiled softly. "Now, Jobe, vhat is your true name?"

Casper might as well have grown another head for the look Jobe gave him. Was this some kind of trick question?

"Jobe Hornby?"

Casper laughed softly at his response, as if he were nothing but a child stating the very opposite of the obvious and slowly shook his head.

"Nien, not zhat name, zhe name of vhat you _are,_ vhat you vill ultimately become-"

"Don't listen to him." A sharp groan more that a voice cut in and Jobe's eyes skipped past the form of Casper, looking at Virgil as she struggled to right herself. The girl panted as she drew herself up, grimacing at the pain shooting through her midriff. "Please, just don't-"

A snarl from the now rising Casper cut her shaky words short.

"Don't you think you've caused enough disruption already?" But for once, the girl didn't do her usual trick of dropping her gaze as he stormed towards her, letting her eyes meet those of the dominant party. "You've never appreciate vhat has been offered to you! It's bad enough zhat you throw it back in our faces, but now you try to corrupt his mind und turn him against our cause!"

"Oh, come off it," She lent towards him, eyes narrowed into twin slits and hissed; "Corrupt his mind? If anyone's mind has been corrupted, it's yours."

"Blasphemy!"

"Just look around you," Virgil went on, not seeming to notice that with every word she muttered, the more blood rushed to the German's head, making the chords in his neck stand out like thick strands of wire. "Have they really managed to convince you that a god that's created this…" She vaguely jerked her head towards the nearest surface that ran thick with rot and decay. "Is going to be capable of creating anything that even resembles paradise?"

"Damn you, bite your tongue!" The man had begun to shake, those overly long dancing madly at his side as they searched for something to take their frustration out on. Virgil just grinned.

"I think you're just scared…"

The fingers arched into claws, digging into the man's own leg.

"In fact, I know you're scarred. You're just looking for away out of the mess you managed to get yourself into."

"I'm varning you…"

They dug ever deeper. Jobe winced, expecting to see four little patches of red slowly start blooming from the point where Casper's fingertips sunk into the material.

"You can't bear to think of the concicuenses of your actions, can you? You bought into what you thinks going to be the easy way out, didn't you?" The words began to run together in a frantic torrent as they flooded from Virgil's mouth, still twisted into a crooked smile as if Casper's reaction was some kind of wonderful drug she couldn't get enough of. "Well, take it from me, there is no easy way out."

"BE QUIET!"

"It's all a lie, one glorious l-"

"SILENCE!"

The man screamed, unable to listen to this desecration of his religion for a moment longer as it scorched his ears. Utter rage consumed him, and without a single hesitation, he swiped out with his foot and caught the leg of the chair. Still screaming, he ripped the one thing stopping the girl from tumbling to her short oblivion free from beneath her and let her fall.

Even from behind the tape, Grace's scream could still be heard as the rope drew tight.

A/N: The end is in sight, i'm just sorry it's going to take us that little bit longer to get there.

The end of this chapter was supprisingly easy to write... ugh, I feel bad.


	44. Envy: The final interlude

Eh, I've been bad and carried on writing this through my exams which I really shouldn't have. Oh well, it's not like I would be revising every single free second I have…

Well, all you who've been wondering what Jobe did to get wound up in this whole fiasco, the moment of truth is at hand…

Envy: The final interlude

_'What have I become, my sweetest friend,_

_Everyone I know goes away in the end._

_You could have it all, my empire of dirt, _

_I will let you down, I will make you hurt.'_

There was a final, twitching kick and silence slid back over the room, its smothering hold broken only by the dry creek of rope. Somehow, that cold, sharp sound was a hundred times worse than the chocking gasps.

Jobe clamped his eyes so tightly shut that his forehead began to ache, tears creeping from their corners and traced the lines of his face, but no matter how hard he pulled the covers of skin over them, they could not forget what they had seen.

Grace sat, as if made of wood, her face frozen in the same expression of incomprehensible shock. The only thing that mover were her pupils as they rolled back and forth, locked on the motionless Virgil's body as it swung to and fro. The rope creaked yet another chord with each gentle swing, singing out her lowly requiem.

Jobe tried to shut his eyes all the tighter, but to no avail. He could still see the moment when Casper lashed out, dragging away her only means of support. He could still see her fall, jerking as the rope caught her. He could still see her eye catching his, the moment before his own clamped themselves safely shut and that, above all else, had been the worst of it all.

Why?

For the simple reason that in her final moments, Virgil had been smiling. The girl knew as plain as day that the man she'd seen do so much and prevail for so long couldn't lift a finger to save her, and grinned morbidly at the fact that he knew it too.

That knowledge alone was enough to kill him.

"You son of a BITCH!"

Casper looked away from his swaying handy-work and saw Jobe glaring up at him from his spot on the floor with so much malice that for a moment, the German though he could feel the hatred in the man's eyes burn at his skin.

"You think you're some kind of holy man?!" Jobe's voice rattled in his throat, failing to reign in control as it rose. "You're nothing but a goddamn murderer!"

Casper shook his head gravely.

"Her death iz of no importance. Vhat are a few moment of pain to zhe eternal Paradise zhat your acceptance vill bring us a few steps close to achieving?" Casper paused his monologue, drawing himself up to his true, towering height. "Now Jobe, vhat is your true name?"

"I DON'T KNOW!" The chained up man roared back, spittle flying from his mouth. Casper watched the minute spray's flight until it seemingly disappeared into the air, remaining un-rattled by his captive's blatant stress. Clearly he hadn't pushed him far enough to see the truth, at least not yet.

"Vhat is your name?" He skipped back, singing the words as he avoided Jobe's thrashing leg and grinned as he left the screaming man kicking at nothing but empty air. "If you can bring yourself to remember, zhis von't have to carry on any longer than"  
"Go to HELL!" Jobe jerked forward, not giving a damn about the sharp pain that exploded in his shoulder as the handcuffs yanked him back down to earth. All he could focus on was what he was going to do to Casper the minuet he broke out of these chains, letting the darkest and most violent thoughts flood his brain and plunging ever deeper into the frenzy he'd drowned himself in.

"You know, I don't think I like zhis attitude…" Casper raise an eyebrow and stifled a smirk as he watched the man before him strived against his bonds, legs slipping against the slick, moist floor. It was almost comical seeing Jobe trying so hard to get anywhere that even the veins running across his eyes looked as though they were about to burst with frustration, but ultimately getting nowhere closer to his target…

But all that struggling stopped the moment Casper whipped the sleek black pistol from behind his back. He cocked the weapon, and the ring of metal sliding over metal was all it took to render Jobe utterly still. In an instant, the delirious anger drained from him, joining the nameless wet that sloshed about the tiled floor and left him with nothing but empty dread to fill the capacity of his body.

Even the tireless creaking of the rope had submitted to the heavy silence.

"I'm sorry, mien friend, but you've forced mien hand…" Jobe's eyes went wide as he watched Casper lazily saunter over to Grace's chair, realization grabbing his heart in a mercilessly icy grip. "Maybe if you hadn't been so stubborn, I vouldn't have to do zhis." The woman screamed, a hideously muffled sound behind the tape that pinned her lips firmly shut no matter how much they writhed, her painfully stretched eyes on the barrel of the gun as it swept upwards. The tears of fear had begun to flow freely down her grimy face as Casper violently pressed the muzzle of the weapon into the side of her head, allowing himself a phantom of a grin to dance across his face as Grace whimpered with each twist of his wrist, digging the metal ever deeper into her skull. He never though, not even in his wildest dreams reducing her to the dog she was would be so… so satisfying.

"Wait…" Jobe choked, trying and failing yet again to free himself. His brain swam, there had to be something, _anything_ he could do to stop-

"Vait? I've been vaiting patiently for you for so long, Jobe." Casper snapped back bitterly, killing Jobe's desperate cry. In the background, Grace howled, cringing as her tormentor dug the firearm even deeper into her scalp with each curt word. "Tell me your name, or I swear to god in heaven I'll blow zhis little bitch's head apart right in front of you!" Casper grinned, his skull like face twisting with manic malice. "And you vouldn't vant her death on your consciences asvell now, vould you?"

Grace wailed; the low, pitiful sound piercing the dank air.

"One…"

Casper's grip on the gun tightened.

"Two…"

Jobe threw his screaming self forward and went crashing face first into the floor as the chains yanked him back.

"Three…"

The still body of Virgil silently observed the scene unfold with unblinking eyes.

"Four…"

A trembling Grace cast Jobe a final, pleading glare.

"Five…"

And in that instant, the revelation hit Jobe with more force than any physical blow could ever muster and he remembered every thing….

Every horrific detail.

8 8 8

It had rained all day. The incessant drumming had been threatening to drive Jobe up the wall and out the window as he'd slaved away in front of a computer, his fingers banging numbly against the keys, ceasing to care what they were typing out.

But he was free of that now, he'd completed the dull, colourless work set but his boss and fled the soul-crushing environment of the office. It almost felt good to be saturated from head to toe, a wonderfully refreshing reminder that he was no longer copped up in the smothering world of fax machines, computers and photocopiers.

Jobe grinned. Today was going to be a good day, after all, with his brain switched off he'd managed to hand his work in substantially early and had been let lose almost an hour before the rest of his colleagues would be allowed to rejoin the real world. To make things better, Phil was going to be coming over and the three of them were going out for the evening, something he hadn't had the time to do in what felt like an era thanks to his job.

But there's always a cloud to accompany the silver lining, and the private rain burst that hovered over Jobe's head came in the form of Julia. They'd moved in together aeons ago and everything had been hunky dory. After all, they were a young couple with all to live for, especially each other but then…well, it was as if things had started to grow stale. At first, they didn't say anything but it was painfully obvious the spark that had pulled them together was starting to dim and the once ravenous hunger they had for the other was starting to ebb. Sure, Jobe still loved her but it just wasn't the same as before.

Then, out of the blue, she'd started accusing Jobe of ignoring her and spending way too much time at his 'precious' job. God, it was as if, as laughable as it sounded, she was jelousy of the damn thing. What, did she actually think he enjoyed pushing pencils? Well, she must have done for the argument that erupted from that particular comment ended with her threatening to walk out the door and the neighbours pondering over the possibility that the young couple down the hall had just murdered each other.

But just like any storm, it didn't last forever and the tension dissipated just as quickly as it came. Maybe Julia had seen the light and realised how unreasonable she was being but Jobe doubted that. She was way too headstrong to be capable of even visualising her self in the wrong let alone actually being it, but something changed and thank god it had. If it hadn't, then maybe one day in the not to distant future the neighbours _would_ have to call the paramedics in…

It was the moment when Jobe slid his snug fitting key into the familiar lock that the sensation hit him; nothing major, just a tingly sensation of apprehension that itched at the back of his skull. The man froze in the hallway and let his hand go lax against the small, metal key. For a moment, it was as if time itself stopped with the man as he stood stock still in the grey afternoon light that flooded through the lonely window at the end of the corridor, the itch slowly progressing in to maddening paranoia. Suddenly, Jobe was utterly alone save for the rapidly growing dread that threatened to consume his entire being in one, hungry gulp.

Somewhere on the floor below, a door slammed shut and the world came back to life.

"Don't be stupid…" Jobe muttered to himself, shrugging off the feeling like one shrugs off an unwanted hand on their shoulder. He applied the tiny bit of pressure needed to the key and the lock sprung open with a dry click.

It was hardly an inviting sound…

_'Stop it!'_ He hissed at himself. _'You're just over blowing everything. It's just a case of the heebie-jeebies, that's all…" _Something in the back of his mind folded its arms stubbornly and scowled, muttering bitterly at being shouted down.

_'You'll be sorry…' _it hissed in a voice dripping with sullenness.

It was just as he was passing over the threshold to his familiar abode that a wave of high laughter hit him and the sense of foreboding bit back with a vengeance.

"Julia?"

No answer, only another crop of giggles that bubbled away somewhere in the depths of the apartment.

Jobe forgot the door as he tentivly began to walk towards the ecstatic sound at a painfully slow pace on feet that did all they could to stick to the carpet, his face contorted by a bewildered scowl. It didn't take long for him to click that the noise was trickling through the partially open bedroom door.

There was a heavy moan.

The man stopped dead in his track, inches from the almost sealed room. The rest of the world seemed to be blotted out in inky blackness, save for the narrow rectangle between the door and its frame. The traffic down bellow had ceased, replaced by animalistic sighs and grunts that threatened to deafen Jobe with their passion.

_'Just walk away…'_ Some little voice deep with him pleaded, trying to pull him with arms made of nothing but air. _'We don't need to see this. Please don't do this to your-'_

Too late. Jobe shifted his feet, allowing the bed to slide in to view. It wasn't empty.

He didn't cry, he didn't scream... hell, Jobe didn't even move a muscle as he let his eyes adjusted to the half-light that barely lit the room. He didn't need to see anyway, for deep down he already knew what was going on in the shadows of the bedroom.

Oddly, it wasn't rage that filled his heart as the image of Julia's body entwined with Phil's burnt itself onto his retina with merciless clarity, nor was it grief. It was something else altogether.

Jelousy.

It tore relentlessly through the man, infecting each and every nerve with its green toxins. It churned in the depths of his stomach and burnt away at the back of his throat, all the while poisoning his brain with its words.

Was this the reason Julia had relented? Had she found someone (ha, his oldest friend no doubt) else who _had_ something Jobe _lacked_? Did that back stabbing little shit think he could _take _her away from _him?_

How dare they.

Jobe stepped back from the door without a sound, his face as blank as a weathered stone. It was as if something had pushed him into the back seat and was running the show for him, but Jobe didn't complain. Hell, he was more than happy to let it take over. He trudged back to the still open door of the apartment, so numbed that he didn't even feel his feet touch the floor as he dragged them listlessly across the floor.

Jobe was just about to draw the door too when he noticed the sleek, polished form of the baseball bat his brother had given him all those years ago poking rigidly out from beneath the coat rack, its handle emerging invitingly from underneath a heavy rain coat.

Jobe smiled to him self, the mirthless expression felt oddly alien on his face as he stooped towards it in an utter trance. He wrapped his hand around the grip and shut the door, closing off the out side world.

_How dare they._

Jobe turned and mechanically crept back towards the bedroom, his clutch on the bat's handle growing tighter with each and every step.

_How DARE they…_

They were two engrossed with each other to notice as he slipped into the room, as silent as the shadows that hugged its sharp corners. With each step, he could feel the darkness's fearful eye on him as he drew up to the bed, praying that someone would turn on a light and banish it before it was forced to witness whatever was about to pass.

No such luck, for neither Julia nor Phil, entwined like a pair of vipers caught in each other's coils noticed the new smouldering presence in the room until it was too late.

"What dose he have that I don't?"

Phil turned his head in time to see a brown blur rapidly engulfing his vision. There was a burst of red and that was the last thing Phil ever saw, the sound of Julia's shrill screaming dying his ears as everything faded to black.

8 8 8

Only god in his infinite wisdom knew how much latter it was when Jobe finally snapped out of the lurid stat of semi-consciousness that had grabbed him only to find himself behind the wheel of his car, hurtling down some barren road that seemed to be cutting straight through the middle of nowhere. The familiar forms of buildings and houses had given way to a barren landscape that held nothing but grey trees that poked out tentivly from a thick fog.

_'What the- how long have I been driving for?'_

He was just about to shift his eyes from the windshield that revealed nothing but a world of empty fog to the clock when they caught on something red. Jobe blinked as his gaze dropped to his hands, pupils dilating to fine dots as the man saw his hands were absolutely _caked_ with vibrant crimson that stood out almost painfully against the colourless world he'd suddenly found himself in.

Jobe let go of the wheel, not noticing the sticky print his hand left as he stared with mute horror at his hand.

"What…what have I done?" He croaked in a dry whisper, trying to hold back the waves of nausea as his mind began to play back the scene like a shaky, old projector and Jobe could do nothing to stop it.

Something heavy thudded dully in the boot as the car thundered along the lonely stretch of highway.

Jobe barely noticed the sign that stated a town known to the rest of the world as Silent Hill was only a few miles away, his mind far more preoccupied with rabidly trying to convince itself that none of that had really happened, and this was all just a mad nightmare…

Maybe if he'd been paying the outside world a little more attention, he would have seen the figure stubble out from the heavy fog that lined the road-side in time to swerve, but alas, that was not so.

A sudden explosion of sound shook the dead hills as the car collide with the shadow, losing all grip it had with the road as its screeching wheels were ripped free of the tarmac surface. There was a crack of metal fracturing as the vehicle hit the road again, this time on its side and came rolling to a halt. Silence slowly crept back over the hills and everything was still once more.

8 8 8

_'What is my name?'_

"envy…" Jobe whispered numbly, but the quiet sound was effortlessly drowned out by a sudden roar of gunshot.

A/N-

And in one fell swoop, I've managed to wipe out the majority of the cast…

Yes, I know this is horribly SH2 but as I've said (or at least think I have), that was the main inspiration of this story. Argh, I feel so cheep…

I've set a deadline for Christmas so this sordid affair should be finished by then. Thank you so very much to everyone who's read, you don't know how motivating you are.


	45. The evil that men do

Chapter 38: The evil that men do

The chair fell to the side, pushed over by the force of the shot and it and its occupant crashed into the floor.

"GRACE!"

But the woman did not respond to her name. Her wide, startled eyes stayed fixed on some invisible point that held them indefinitely, and she was blissfully ignorant to the dark pool of blood that grew around her head like a crimson halo.

"Sorry mien friend," Casper trilled in a voice that lacked any remorse for what he'd just done. "But you vere just zhat little bit too late…"

Jobe said nothing, unable to take his eyes from the still body of his one time friend as his stomach clenched violently. How… how could Casper have done that in such cold blood?

"I know just vhat you're zhinking." Came the tall German's retort to the unasked question as he replaced the pistol in his undersized belt that would have quite easily suffocated most normal built men. "But before you pass judgment, you should ask yourself zhe very same thing."

Jobe tried to come up with some sort of defence but the only thing that came to him was the image of Grace's head snapping back and a torrent of bloody rain erupting from the side of her skull. It left his mouth dry.

"See, you cannot question it," Casper crowed triumphantly, staring at Jobe down the sharp angle of his nose. "For in doing zhat, you vould be doubting vhat it is you are…" He drew a breath, but that dramatics of it all were lost on the audience. "…Envy." Casper closed his eyes in rapture as he spoke the word, letting the sense of fulfilment cores through his veins. The father and his pale prophet had given him a job, to enlighten those chosen seven who were going to aid god in rebuilding this ruined world, and he had finally completed the task they themselves couldn't do. It felt wonderful.

Grinning from ear to ear, Casper knelt down next to the man, pulling the rusty keys that were cut from the very same metal as the handcuffs binding Jobe.

"Come, do not be sad." He whispered in the lifeless man's ear as his nimble fingers worked the lock that held the metal rings around Jobe's wrists firmly shut. "Rejoice in your new found purpose, for you are going to do something marvellous!"

There was a dry snap as the cuffs sprung open.

"You will atone for man and-" But Casper never got the chance to finish for a hand leapt at the German's throat, silencing him with fingers that wrapped themselves greedily around his scrawny throat.

"Bastard!" Jobe rushed to his feet, pushing the thin man back as his other hand joined the first and drew an ever tightening circle around Casper's throat. "You've taken EVERYTHING!" He roared into the man's scrawny face. An eye, wide with naked terror rolled to look at Jobe and silently begged for him to let go.

"Can't…breathe…" Casper wheezed, the words barley able to escape his crushed wind pipe as he used up the precious oxygen already rotting in his lungs.

Jobe only tightened his grip.

"I don't want to save the world. I don't want to be a herald of your goddamn paradise. I don't want to remember!" With each word, the fingers wove themselves that little bit tighter; forcing livid red veins to crop up on the surface of Casper's rolling eyes. As the suffocating man stared at the damp, grey ceiling, the panic boiling in his chest took over and he found his long fingers snatching madly for the hand gun.

"And you, YOU took the last two people I had left! When is it going to be enough? WHEN?!" Through the rabid rage, Jobe saw the skeletal hand reaching for the exposed handle. Snarling, he let go of the man's throat and ripped it from his belt, effortlessly beating Casper to it.

"Nein!" The German screamed, reeling back from his former prisoner as Jobe took aim, his face twisted into a wrathful sneer. This was so very wrong… it wasn't meant to be like this. He should be gladly accepting his title, embracing it with open-

'_BLAM'_

The though was cut short by the sudden eruption of sound, magnified in the cramped confides of the room and Casper suddenly became very aware of the odd sensation spreading through his body from his chest. It felt as though someone had punched him, painlessly forcing their fist straight through his body. Confused, he looked down at the epicentre of this strange feeling and felt his eyebrows knot together when his gaze was met by a small circle of red, standing out against his stainless white shirt. Casper looked back up at Jobe with the face of a lost child.

"You- you shot me?"

But the only answer Casper got was a scream as Jobe lent his head back and vented his anguish into the rancid air before pulling the trigger again.

And again….

And again…

Pretty soon the only sound accompanying his song of pain was the hollow click of an empty chamber. He let the gun drop to his side and a dry, desolate sob broke into his roar.

Ever since Jobe had ventured into Silent Hill, a weight of fear, pain and sorrow had been condensing over him, following him wherever he went like some personal vulture, forever wheeling over his head. It was now that the thin supports holding it up finally gave under the impossible load, splintering like twigs and letting the whole thing come crashing down on the man.

He fell to the floor like a dead weight and cried, curling up on the cold, uncaring floor and whished for it to all just go away.

But it wouldn't, and Jobe knew it. The slumped form of Casper looked back at him with glazed eyes at the end of a gory trail smeared down the wall, serving as a painful testimony to what he truly was….

…Just another monster.

The end of this is nearly here. I know that was short but I though it would be better if I ended this chapter here and you all must be getting sick of reading five page chunks. Next chapter's going to be a little lighter as we go back to Parker and Claudia…

Until then, adieu.


	46. Master of puppets

Remember when I said this was going to be done by Christmas? Yeah, that was a lie.

Chapter 39: Master of puppets

"We have lost him…"

Parker looked up from the heavy glass, letting the red liquid within slip to the base of the transparent, concave goblet.

"And, pray tell Sister Wolf, just who have we misplaced?"

The woman looked up from her lap as she sat perched on the end of the long wooden bench, almost as stiff as the material she rested on.

"Casper is gone." She stated bluntly. "I think he may be-"

"But did he deliver the message?" The Father twitched, rolling the vein of glass between his fingers. "Dose the great truth ring out in our angel's ears?"

Claudia didn't answer at once, letting the soft silence drag out.

Richard sighed. He didn't even bother try to understand the colourless woman's 'gift', something dubbed but the cult's acolytes as _the sight_. All he knew was that it allowed her to see more than most people could ever conceive for she had the ability to view the world and its people from a unique perspective. It had been most helpful in locating their god's earth-bound vessel…

"Yes, but I fear he still renounces it. The other one's influence holds a remarkable amount of sway over him."

Parker grunted something as he lent against the church's alter, his grip on the neck of the glass tightening dangerously.

"Damn that girl…To think, all our preaching's were outdone by that wayward child…" His back rose and fell sharply as he snorted. "That self appointed affliction…"

A frown creased Claudia's brow.

"But doesn't the news of Casper's demise…disturb you at all?"

Parker turned to reveal that cool, sly grin dominating his face.

"My dear Sister, I fear you are to much the humanist for your own good!" He raised the wine to his lips, peering over the top of the glass at her. "Anyway, the boy had fulfilled his duty to us and our mutual god, ergo; his death should not be considered a loss." Parker drew a long sip of the deep, red liquid that danced within the crystal container like molten ruby. Not once did he let his eyes wonder from Claudia's mask of a face as he probed for some kind of reaction. "In conclusion, Sister Wolf," The drained glass fell to his side. "The boy's death disturbs me not one single iota."

There was a hollow pause.

"Sometimes, I wonder at how you can call yourself a man of god…"

"I have faith, don't I?" A wicked little smirk played on his lips. "I have faith in god… in paradise…" He slunk towards the bench, his shoes falling without noise on the lush red carpet that covered the church's floor like a second skin. "In you. Dose that not make me more of a 'man of god', as you so righteously put it, than most of our associates?"

Claudia dropped her head as the man slid into the bench, still twiddling the empty glass between his fingers. As much as she hated to admit it, he was right. After all, Parker was the only one who was yet to turn on her with teeth and claws bared…

She couldn't gauge just how long ago it was when he'd approached her with that obscene proposal that would probably see them expelled from the house of Silent Hill's arcane god if their fellow followers ever caught wind of it…

8 8 8

"Ah, the proverbial crying wolf!"

Claudia stopped dead in her tracks.

"And I suppose you've come to mock me as well?" The woman balled her fists, preparing herself for the imminent verbal onslaught that was going to come crashing into her back.

"Ah yes, I heard that little speech you made during the meeting. Quite the non-conformist, aren't we Sister Wolf?" Claudia glowered down the empty hallway in front of her, the door at the end of it bearing the brunt of the seething gaze intended for whoever was behind her. This was all she needed, yet _another_ lecture on the fact that she dained to suggest paradise was not open for purely the believers…

With a weary sigh, she turned round to face her latest critic.

"Caused quite a stir just now, huh?"

"I'm more than aware of that." She curtly replied, glaring down at the sly little man. "Now, if you are only hearing to heckle me further I would thank you to leave me alone. I can assure you I've heard it all before…"

The maturing man smirked, pushing his glasses up the bumpy path of his crooked nose.

"I wager you're yet to hear someone say 'I believe you'…"

Claudia stiffened, going as ridged as the starched collar of her shirt.

"Excuse me?" She stumbled as her train of thought came to a crashing halt into the solid structure of his last sentence. Did he just imply what she thought she did?

The man began to pace back and forth along the narrow confides of the hall, occasionally, letting his eyes wonder over the surface of one of the many religious paintings that decked its walls.

"Well, why should only those who practice our religion be allowed to cross the thresh-hold to paradise on the day when god finally returns? There is many a good soul out there who just simply isn't aware of our practices and our compatriots seem wondrously oblivious to this factor. If we were to let only those who believe into the kingdom of god…" He paused, flashing a grin at the woman in black. "Well, paradise would be a very lonely place indeed."

Claudia nodded in agreement, for it had dawned on her a very long time ago that their cult was probably never going to achieve the notoriety of more…conventional and mainstream religions. At least, not in her life time.

"But, instead of listening to 'revolutionaries' like us, they continue to burry them-selves in the belief that only they, the holy mass, are fit to enter."

"And everyone else can just burn in hell…" The woman whispered dryly.

"Exactly," The priest spun round, giddy passion burning in his eyes. "That doesn't sound like the kind of thing a god of love would condone, now dose it?" He let the pause stretch so far that Claudia felt as though she might actually fall into it if she didn't fill it right that second.

"No."

"Do you not believe that everyone deserves the chance to step into the glorious light of god?"

"Yes!" The woman exclaimed before she had the chance to realise she was getting carried away in the priest's river of heated words, catching herself only when it was too late. "But…" The priest cocked his head as Claudia began, the infectious joy of his words already wearing off. "You know as well as I that only those free from sin may enter the kingdom. I fear that even a god would not be able to under take the burden of all man's evil, especially in this day and age."

She'd turned to leave the preacher, however, even her 'sight' was blind to the actions she'd just put into motion…

Time passed, and Claudia had all but forgotten about the conversation for something else had grabbed her attention and refused to let go.

God was still here.

The revelation had utterly consumed her, taking up almost every single conscious though she had until Claudia feared it might swallow her whole as she contained it with in her skull, especially since she was yet to share her discovery with anyone.

And why should she? The others would just greedily tare this god into the world with cruel and eager hands, condemning it while only saving themselves. The thought of it made her sick to her stomach. If anyone was going to raise the god from its human vessel, it would be Claudia. Out of the entire sect, it seemed only she appreciated what god was truly built to do; Save mankind. Had she not died to do that in the beginning? Why should she suddenly turn round and destroy it?

But still, there was the question of whether she would be able to, for you see, unlike the 'all-powerful' and limitless god of Christianity and Judaism, the cult's lord had her bound. She could not just snap her celestial fingers and make something so and quietly, Claudia feared that in trying to deliver all of man to her kingdom, God might just kill herself once more and return to the dust that bore her all that time ago…

…But Richard Parker had found an answer.

It seemed that the priest had been doing some research into that particular dilemma in the time that had elapsed since their first meeting and made the most interesting discovery.

"Are-"Claudia dropped her voice to a barely audible whisper save the other members milling about the room should overhear their conversation. "Are you sure?"

Parker's grin widened and he lent forward over the table while the fingers of his hand knotted themselves into a lose ball.

"I kid you not, my dear. It's all down there in the library if you want to have a look at it for yourself."

Claudia pushed back into her seat, a sensation of glorious numbness seeping through her.

"So you see, God dose not need to carry the weight of man's wickedness alone, in fact, she won't be required to do it at all…"

Claudia blinked, for it was then that her conscience decided to raise its hand.

"But what of those seven who have to carry the burden between them?"

Parker half-heartedly waved a hand at the woman as if to shoo away the though like some buzzing gnat.

"None will cry over them. I told you before, those who are chosen, they will be the dregs of society. They will be men and women who indulge their persific sin to the point where they really are nothing more than an embodiment of it…" Parker trailed off, observing the expression on his fellow conspirator's face with a raised eye-brow. The woman looked as though she'd just swallowed something that severally disagreed with her. "Anyway, what is the suffering of a few to the salvation of millions?"

Claudia smiled a weak, watery smile and looked up at the Father.

"Yes, you are right." She rose from the chair and made to leave. "It will be for the best, won't it?"

And that was how the whole affair had kicked off…

8 8 8

"...alive."

"Pardon?" Claudia snapped her head back, ripping it free from the grip of nostalgia.

"I said doing all this; doesn't it just make you feel so alive?" Parker mused aloud, examining the wine-glass against the candle light.

"Doing what?" Claudia echoed as the sensation of missing the plot grew even more evident.

"Why, saving the world of course!"

"You mean playing god with these people's lives?" Richard lowered the glass, stung by the word's sourness.

"Now now, my dear, there was no need for that." He glanced at the woman over the top of his glasses. "You know as well as I that someone will need to atone for man. I swear, you just need to learn to loosen that collar a wee bit or you're going to strangle yourself with your own moral code!"

Claudia looked away, knowing he was right. Sacrifices were going to have to be made and she should be thankful that they were on as small a scale as they were.

Yes, they were going to save the world but in the process, they'd damned themselves along with their so called angels.

A/N: Elliot, I must thank you for your extreamly extensive view and CC. Your right about the gramma, it is pretty shaky and I know I OD on comers sticking them in every chance I get. I plan to revise this once I'm finished because if I started going back now, I'd probably never get this finished.

Also, I totally agree with you on your point on the gratuitous over description, afterall, the mind has a knack of creating far more terrifying things than I could ever write down. I must apologise for waffling and getting carried away with these. I will make an effort to amend my wicked ways after reading your crit…


	47. Thesis of an angel

Chapter 40: Thesis of an angel

The street was deathly still, save for the banks of off-white fog that eternally milled aimlessly in the stagnate air. Not a sound dared to break the oddly peaceful scene and at this particular moment, this was one of the few places in the world that truly did live up to its hideously appropriate name…

But then something shifted in the mist, destroying the illusion of timeless. The shadow lurched up the road, moving with an erratic stiffness as its footfall chased away any renaments of silence.

Jobe walked on without a doubt in his mind as to where he was going. Already, he could visualise the church in his mind's eye. He could remember the feel of its age-old door under his fingers, the smell of varnished wood that had clogged his nostrils and the warm, welcoming air that had embraced him like a hug as he'd entered. How funny, to think that he'd actually been right to suspect that the supposedly holy building and those within it were hiding their true agendas behind smiling masks.

He'd been well and truly manipulated by all of them, like a puppet forced to oblige every whim of the jerking hand that hovered above it. Parker had posed as his friend, and along with Claudia, the pair had been forcing him down a carefully laid out path that would ultimately end in his destruction. They'd wanted him to see every mind warping horror in hope that he would re-member the equally horrific truth. Again and again, they'd forced him to re-live his crimes and now they actually had the ordacity the think he'd embrace them and their beliefs. How could they think that he'd be willing to surrender the few shreds of humanity he had left to truly become nothing more that a monster in order to save a world that was doing just fine as it was…

Jobe trudged onwards on feet that no longer felt the tarmac beneath them, the now ownerless kantana gripped loosely in a numb hand. The blade was surprisingly heavy; Virgil had always made it look as though the obscene weapon was as light as paper-

Virgil…The thought stung bitterly. That child-like girl had seen him through so much and he'd failed so hard in re-paying her. He'd just sat there, praying that it would all end as she dangled from the ceiling, suspended by a rope that was relentlessly drawing her throat to a close. She hadn't deserved to die like that, hell, no one did but especially not her after all she'd been through.

And then there'd been Grace…

The man was just about to start torturing himself with the memories and rub salt into these particular wounds when a voice snapped him from the limbo of his mind.

"Jobe?"

The man stropped, bile churning in his gut. It- it couldn't be…

Jobe turned with a deliberate slowness to face the person who'd addressed him, only to come face to face with a supposedly dead girl he'd been mourning only seconds before.

"I-I-I called for you but you didn't stop…" Virgil trailed off, the look on Jobe's face killing her voice. The man was staring at her as if just by standing there, she was defying the laws of logic, physics and any other particular set of unbreakable rules that happened to governed the world.

"Did- have I done something bad?" She asked, hands wringing together in a nervous knot. Her fingers grew all the more frantic when Jobe's expression of horror still clung stubbornly to his face.

"No…" He muttered, stepping back. "This- this just can't be possible. I…" the girl cocked her head to the side as the man took another step. "I watched you die."

The girl stiffened.

"What?"

Jobe ducked his head, his features contorted with anguish as his brain feverish tire to salvage some sense of reasoning.

"This isn't possible. You can't be standing here because you're dead. You're back in the water station hanging from the ceiling with a noose round your neck." His grip on the sword tightened. "I saw it happen… so this can't be possible."

Virgil was looking at the man with an expression of utterly lost confusion, a hand groping at her neck as the man continued raving.

"Just what the hell are you anyway? God damn it, you were DEAD! Nothing could survive that long without air…this doesn't make sense…" he grabbed a handful of stale and crusty hair. "None of this makes any sense." Jobe looked back up at the girl, about to launch into another rant but stopped when he saw how still she'd suddenly become. The hand had stopped worrying at her neck, gripping it tightly.

"…"

Jobe squinted, trying to make out the silent words that slipped from her lips.

"…ot now…not again, please…"

Jobe allowed himself to forget that he was refusing to acknowledge her existence in a vain attempt to preserve some precious sense of logic.

"Virgil?"

Her hand arched into a claw, digging deeper into her skin but then, as if some nerve had been severed, it dropped limply to her side.

"You know what I am." Her voice rasped as she muttered into her chest and answering a question Jobe had almost all but forgotten he'd asked.

Despite the little voice screaming that no good was going to amount from this conversation, Jobe stood his ground.

"Honestly, I can't say I do…"

"But I'm just the same as you." The trademark apprehension had dropped from her voice, leaving it as cold as the air that swirled between the two.

"And what's that meant to mean?"

The girl took a slow step towards him, moving sluggishly as if the mist had been replaced with thick water.

"Along time ago, I wanted to forget and run and hide, just like you…" She took another step forward, walking in a gradual, straight line towards the man. "And, just like you, I found myself here instead; the last place on earth that actually wants, no, needs us. This place, it gives people like you and me a reason to go on." Another step. Even through the fog that roamed the gap between the two, Jobe saw the crimson droplet of blood fall from her bowed face and splash against the black tarmac. "But now that we have to face what lurks beneath the surface, there's another question that arises; do we really want to continue?"

Jobe flinched at her words. This might as well be a stranger coming wondering towards him, for those words sure as hell didn't belong to the girl he'd met all that time ago in the sewers.

"Who are you?"

The figure stopped dead at his question.

"You know my name." She echoed in a voice that lacked any feeling.

"Virgil?"

"No, that's the name you gave me…"

"Angela."

"My real name Jobe," She looked up, the trail of blood that leaked from her nose traced the lines of the sardonic leer on her face. "What is my _real_ name?"

Jobe gasped, for when she lifted her head, the answer came to him immediately. This was no stranger before him. He'd met this person a time that felt so long ago, just before they snatched the wheel of a van he'd been naively hoping he could escape from the town in and rammed it straight into a brick wall.

"Wrath…" It closed its eyes at the sound of its name, grinning like a demented Cheshire cat. "But…how?"

"I told you, I'm just the same as you-"

"But I'm not some kind of monster, not like you." His stomach churned as the image of the beast sprawled across the bonnet of a car dyed red with blood and riddled by shot sprung to mind. Jobe took a step back as it lurched forward, trying to prolong the lifespan of the rapidly closing distance between them.

"HA!" It laughed, rocking its head back. "Do you honestly still believe that crock of shit you're force feeding yourself? You self righteous bastard…" It threw a hand back, gesturing to the vast depth of milky air around them. "Do you honestly think you would be here if that was true?"

No reply. Jobe dropped his head. He wasn't like her-

"You did something, didn't you?" It rasped at the silent man, grinning as it slowly ripped the sense of soothing self assurance away from beneath his feet. "You just listened to that little voice that told you to go ahead and do the _right_ thing, huh?"

Since when was bloody, selfish murder the correct course of action?

"It wasn't right!" Jobe's head snapped up and he glowered at the beast before him. For a moment, nothing longer than a split second, he could swear that his gaze had been met by those cruel, silver eyes staring out from a truly monstrous visage but when he blinked, it was just the girl.

"Yes it was! At the time, didn't it seem like the just think to do?" It shook its ragged head, hissing through clenched teeth. "That pig…he didn't deserve to even breathe. She was always too weak, but I made her take that knife and do what she should have done a long time ago." Jobe suddenly got the feeling that this wasn't about him any more as he watched it rant on. "But then, who would everyone else see as the person in the wrong?" It lifted its almost mournful eyes, meeting the man's bemused gaze. "Dear old daddy? No, that fucker would get off because he was dead, but her? She'd be the one who they'd point the finger at and call the monster just because she'd done the_ right_ thing and listened to _me._" The last word was nothing more than a bitter hiss as it pounded its chest with a clenched fist. For a moment, it paused before taking up its piece again. "Now, I've come to realise that it's stupid to try and dodge what this town intends for us to do. Don't you see? It's recognised our potential for doing the _right_ thing and we, out of everyone out there have been chosen to go on to do something wonderful. We can't leave, how could we knowing what it is we've been chosen to do? Anyway, even if we could, we'd just go home to a witch hunt."

"But dose she agree with you?" The man asked, interrupting the beast's repertoire. It looked up at him, as if the question mildly surprised it.

"The girl? Of course not, you know that yourself. It's only because she's too weak, too afraid to take on the responsibility of bringing about this new beginning. Instead, she insists on hiding in some dark, dank corner and pretends that she can still run away…"

It let out a bark of laughter as if it had just let rip a wondrously hilarious joke. Jobe missed the obscure punch-line if there was one.

"It's funny, but if you think about it, she's the real monster here. Don't you think that delaying man's salvation just because you're so afraid is a greater sin than gutting one single man? Even now she's hiding from me, you and everything else that might look at her in some other lonely level of this place."

'_Nowhere'_

"But I guess," It went on, peering at Jobe from the corner of its eyes. "You're just as afraid as her, huh?"

It smirked at the sneer Jobe shot it.

"No I'm not." He curtly snapped back. It was a very convincing performance.

"So why is it you continuously refuse to embrace what it is you are, even after you know the truth?" The man averted his gaze, scowling at the tarmac with a glare hash enough to scold a hole right through the black surface. "Just face it; you've got nothing left and nowhere to go so why run?"

There was no reply from the man.

"Answer me!" The goading tone had given away to frustration but still, there was no answer. The beast's lip curled in anger and it stamped the ground with its merciless foot, not flinching as the shards of solid tar bit into its skin. "Damnit, why don't you accept what you are!?"

Its teeth nearly went straight through its lip when the man turned its back to the seething creature.

"Because I can't just can't bear to live with what I did and if I accept it…well, then I really am nothing but another monster. Onto of that, I don't want to play a part in creating some hell like this either…" And with that, he walked on and continued along the road that would enviably lead him to the church. A second past and the sound of the creature's laughter came chasing him up the street.

"Oh god, you really are as stupid as she is! You think you can just walk in there and kill them and everything's going to be a-okay? Do you still think you can get out of all this?"

Jobe's back, slowly being erased by the fog as he slipped further and further into it, gave no indication of heading her words.

"You're a fool!"

He stopped.

"At least I'm not delusional. Guess that doesn't make me as big a fool as you, huh?" He retorted dryly. Jobe didn't bother to turn to see what effect his words had on the thing that had been festering away beneath Virgil's fragile surface. He didn't have time to carrying on arguing with the obnoxious sin, especially when he was finally so close to those who had been tormenting him all this time-

Something sliced into his ear with the sharpness of a razor blade. Jobe cringed, dropping the kantana as he slammed his hands over his ears.

'_The hell?'_

It had been a sound, though nothing Jobe had ever met on god's green earth could produce something as painfully shrill as that. Maybe it you were stupid enough to hold your ear over a crack in a high pressure steam pipe, you might just be able to stimulate the same effect, but who in their right state of mind would want to try that?

"Gah!" Ever through the plug formed by his fingers, the noise was still able to seep into his ear hole and corrode his brain as it sunk into each and every craves of the organ it could find. He twisted his spine sharply as he glanced back down the street at the epicentre of the barrage of sound.

No prize for guessing where it was coming from.

Its head was back, allowing it to pump the foul scream that tore its way out from its mouth directly into the grey air. Jobe could see the cords in its neck twist and bulge as it roared, the veins running under the tattered skin pumped up like cords of iron.

Jobe felt himself cry 'shut up' but the words were effortlessly absolved by the roar that threatened to shatter his skull through sheer volume. He slammed his eyes close, muttering a volley of inaudible curses as his knees hit the black and artificial ground. The man brought himself to glower at the bellowing monstrosity but almost let the fingers drop from his ears when he saw the thing standing in Virgil's place. It was as if in the space of time it had taken him to blink, she'd been wiped clean form this existence and replaced with that monster.

It met his gaze with glassy eyes and the man shuffled back as the tip of its sharp foot clicked on the tarmac with its advancing steps. It was still screaming, the torrent of unrelenting sound pouring from a gaping maw crammed with more than capable teeth as its wings unfurled. It beat them once, twice, cracking like a gunshot each time they hit the heavy air as Jobe scrabbled even further back with the trembling sword pointed at the monster, praying that it would do some good if the creature chose to dive at him. It hovered in the air for a moment as the sails of tattered flesh and webbed membrane held it suspended above the ground, still baying its warped song…

…and then it launched itself forward.

Jobe saw it coming and the ghost of courage left him as it rapidly chewed up the precious meters between them. He yelped, dropping the sword and hugging the wet tarmac for all he was worth. Oh god, in a few seconds, those hideous travesties of feet were going to gut him like a-

A torrent of empty air passed over him.

Jobe opened his eyes, the creature's dirge already dying in his ears. There was no pain, no blood and defiantly no hellish bat stooped over him with its spear-like extremities stuck in his chest. It…it has gone straight by him.

The man staggered to his feet, staring in dumb wonder at the bank of mist that had swallowed the beast as his mind flashed back to the other sins he'd encountered. Had they all been people once who just hadn't been able to contain their urges before being dragged here and forced to play their part in some freak show? No, that couldn't be it…those things, they were monsters. After all,

_(how dose that explain what you just saw happen toVirgil?)_

how could they be

_(and what dose that make you?)_

human…

Jobe heard the dry crack of his argument falling apart and collapsing into a cloud of imaginary dust. It still didn't make sense and Jobe only succeeded in making his exhausted and assaulted brain reel with in his skull. Oh well, there were still two people still alive who could explain all this to him…

With a tired laugh, Jobe gripped the sword tighter than ever and trudged off into the mist, chasing a monster's trail to the church of Silent Hill.

- - - - -

A/N: we are inching towards the end, but I don't know if you belive me about that by now… As for that particular little revelation, yes, everybody probably saw this one coming from five miles off and I must appologise for the misspellings in this and the rest of the story. I would like to think the spell cheker and I get most of them, but more than a few slip through.

Thank you again for reading and sticking with it this far.


	48. Hubris and Nemesis

Cross my heart and hope to die, there are only three chapters to go before this is all over (well, two plus epilogue), so sit back and enjoy the beginning of the end.

Chapter 41: Hubris and Nemesis

'_There's no way out, _

_You can scream, can shout, _

_It's too late now…' _

_- The Luke Warm_

Jobe stopped, his fingers trembling against the wood. Beyond these twin doors was the reason he'd dragged back to this hell hole that was so much more than just a town.

He was finally get those answers he'd been searching for all this time and get away from all this, an unbelievable situation that had been spiralling madly out of control from the moment he'd set his foot down on the tarmac beyond a sign that cheerfully proclaimed 'Welcome to Silent Hill!'

Or was it just cold revenge that had spurred him on? Was he only going in there to butcher the two people who he'd believed had turned his life upside down when the only person who could honestly have the blame laid at their feet was himself? Even now, was he still running from the god honest truth, that he'd bloodied his hands long before he'd even set foot in this town? Jobe smiled grimly but the sickly phantom of a grin did not live for long. He was a living oxymoron, he screamed at the world that he wasn't a monster yet here he was, sword in hand and malicious thoughts in his heart.

'_Well, I guess there's only one way we're going to find out, huh?'_

Jobe grimaced in the cold air and applied that extra little bit of pressure to the door.

8 8 8

"…So now that you're…"

Parker trailed off, looking up from the rag of a girl who sat in a dejected crumple against one of the church's pillars.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" He straightened up, ignoring the creek in his back that served as a reminder to the testament that he wasn't getting any younger. "Sister Wolf?" The woman in question glanced up from a heavy volume she'd been leafing through as it rested awkwardly on the church's alter. "It would appear as though the prodigal son has finally returned to the coop." His voice slowly rose in humour but when he looked again at Jobe, the expression on the man's face clearly stated that feeling wasn't mutual. In fact, Jobe looked as though he wanted to kill someone.

This was not a good progression.

"Then, has returned to us on his own accord?" Claudia's voice floated past him as if Jobe wasn't ever there.

"Yes…" Parker felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand to at the man's tepid reply. It was so cold, but then, he hadn't really expected Jobe to still be the fresh young man he'd been the first time he'd come wondering into the church.

Jobe took a step towards the pair but fell short when he finally noticed the form of Virgil bunched up against one of the supportive pillars. Without thinking, his grip on the sword tightened.

"What are you doing here?" But the question fell on deaf ears. Virgil seemed totally oblivious to his arrival and chose to carry on with picking at the pillar's painted surface.

"She has finally seen the folly of her ways and come back to us. Now, she may assume her rightful role in the re-creation of the world." Claudia stepped out from behind the preacher's podium, her pale and bleached hands clasped together as if in prayer. "Are you not here for the same reason?"

Parker inwardly cringed. For someone as 'gifted' as his accomplice, she could sure as hell be unobservant. Just one look at the man and anyone could see that he wasn't about to come running over and embrace them in a warm hug. Running over with that obscene sword drawn and ready to split skin to the bone was a far more likely possibility.

Virgil peered up in time to see the dirty glare Jobe shot her of utter betrayal and quickly returned to desecrating the pillar. The man looked away from her in sick disgust. How could she just give up like that, after everything she'd said and done? Forget wrath, anyone could see that her crime was hypocrisy.

"I'm not here to embrace your god." He spat.

"Then why are you here?"

Jobe glowered at the woman. She was already wearing that look of pensive questioning, an expression that probed into the man and wormed its way under his skin. The urge to throw himself at her and wrap his fingers around her throat become almost unbearable.

"How dense are you!? Can't you work it out for yourself, you goddamn witch? I don't want anything to do with this!"

"My boy," Parker broke in, "That is not a decision that you can-"

"I don't care!" Jobe roared, wheeling round to face the stout man. "Do you think that you can just turn around to me and say do this and become some freak for the good of humanity?"

"But don't you think you own this world's people that after the atrocities of your actions?" The tell-tail monotone voice of Claudia pressed.

Jobe stopped, the vehement words that were just about to sprout from his lips dying before they could make even the faintest sound. The hair-lie crack of self doubt widened with a brittle snap, allowing a question Jobe hadn't even considered entertaining slip into his mind.

'_Are they right?'_ It asked in a voice so innocent.

As much as they stung, the words rang with a painful clarity for there was no denying that he had done something awful, monstrous even.

Parker smiled smugly, peering over the rim of his glasses as he smirked to himself.

"My boy, it almost pains me to see how lost you are." He cocked his head to the side, beaming warmly at the man who was slowly falling apart before his eyes. Jobe's hand caught his forehead, the question booming away inside his head so loudly that he was barely aware of the preacher's mellow voice.

'_Are they right?'_

"But there is a way to free yourself from this self inflicted agony…" Jobe looked up as Parker let the sentence hang, dangling the defeated man at the end of it. "Just let go…" The aging man breathed the words, stretching his hands and fingers out in an arc that gradually lost their tension. God, he made it sound so tempting…Jobe could practically taste the fantastic liberation from guilt and…well, everything that came with his words.

'_I think…I think they might be?'_

"Renounce what it is you think you are" Claudia goaded from behind. "It will be so much easier this way, for you, for all of us. Transgress beyond the bonds of man and become what it is you were meant to be…"

Didn't he deserve a break by now, after all that had happened?

"Tell me, Miss Orosco," Parker's glasses flashed in the soft candle light as he turned to the girl scrunched up against the wall. "How dose it feel to know that you are free and forgiven in the eyes of god as you serve her?" Jobe looked on in his near euphoric state of clam, a half smile creping across his face. Angela's tattered finger paused, hovering above the plaster it was so intent on destroying.

"Free?" She wheezed in a broken voice and slowly turned her head to the group, her scared and bandaged face hidden behind a curtain of filthy hair. "I am not free…" Jobe saw an eye between the strands of limp black slowly roll on to him and felt the breath catch in his throat. "And this place will never forgive me."

The eye remained on him. Whatever little life had been in them before was snuffed out, leaving them dead and tired.

'_NO! They're wrong, they're never right!'_ Something screamed in his ear, loud enough to make him jump back and break the gentle spell of words the priest had spun.

The glower very quickly returned to his face.

"You're playing me again, aren't you? This…this is a lie and I'm not going to buy it anymore." His shaking arm rose, pointing the long kantana square at Parker's chest. A curious Virgil watched the scene unfold, slowly pulling herself up the pillar and to her feet.

"I'm not going to forget what you've done to me, and what you're trying to make me is just sick!"

The sword quivered inches from the Preacher's black shirt. Parker stared at the wavering tip, an expression of mild amusement at the sudden twist on his face as he eyed the kantana.

For a moment, all was still inside the church save for the slowly dancing candles and the wax that lolled down them in fat licks. Virgil's gaze flittered from her beloved sword to Parker and back to Jobe.

Sword. Parker. Jobe.

The man gritted his teeth as his fingers wound themselves ever tighter round the hilt.

Sword. Parker. Jobe.

Parker smiled lazily at the man at the other end of the kantana.

Sword. Parker. Jobe.

Jobe had begun to shake, his teeth clenched so neatly they were fit to shatter like glass.

Sword. Park-

"You will not do it." Claudia commented, killing the mounting tension in a fell swoop. Suddenly, the air had lost its charge and the world moved again. Jobe glanced sideways at her as he tried to keep tabs on Richard, the kantana and her all at once. Even though the sword's aim stayed true, it had lost any credibility.

"And why is that?"

"Because if you do so, you will prove once and for all what it is you truly are." Claudia smiled triumphantly. "You are so eager to shed his blood in an attempt to console yourself for your own deeds… doesn't that sound like the acts of a monster to you, Envy?"

Jobe filched at her final word and the sword shook all the more violently in his clammy grip to the point where it looked like the metal itself was having a fit. He was caught in the sticky fingers of Catch-22.

"But if I kill you…" the kantana's tip ventured ever nearer to Parker's chest. " You won't be around to make me save mankind."

"My boy," Parker flashed a crocodile smile at the trembling man. "People don't 'die' here, they just move on. Now," He laid a single, callous finger on the flat of the blade, carelessly pushing it aside. "Are we going to halt this utterly mortifying behaviour, or are we going to have to persuade you to let go of your precious 'humanity' with the iron hand of god herself?"

Jobe felt The Father's eyes bore into him and suddenly as small as a pupil before a particularly stern principal who was practically salivating at the chance to crush him under foot.

"Wait!" A small voice broke the growing silence. Three heads turned to Virgil as she reluctantly pushed herself away from the pillar she'd been timidly clinging onto.

'_What the fuck are you doing?!'_ The twisted voice of Wrath hissed in a frequency only her ears could pick up. _'Didn't we agree that you were going to be good?_'

Virgil carried on, regardless of the vindictive whisper.

"Jobe- Jobe really doesn't deserve this… He's not a b-b-bad person…"

"Oh really?" Parker washed over her feeble voice, raising his eyebrow. "Tell me, my most troublesome dear, how exactly do you know that to be true?"

"Well…I…" The girl floundered, hands wringing into nervous knots.

"Were you there when he killed the two closest people in his life out of jealousy?" Claudia pressed. Virgil dropped her head.

"No…"

'_God, you're such an embarrassment.'_ A noiseless voice spat in her ear. _'Was it too much to ask that you just be quiet and let me handle this?'_

The girl's hand balled up. Why had she let _it_ talk her into giving up like this, in fact, why was she listening to _it _at all?

'_Because without me, you're weak, you're worse than nothing…'_

No, that wasn't true-

'_Yes it is, and you know it. Hell, if it hadn't been for me, he'd probably still be fucking you ri-'_

SHUT UP!

Virgil slammed her hands over her ears to block out the malicious words that crept down her throat and festered away like rotten meat in her stomach. What had she done? She'd let them finally get her after years of running and swearing that she wouldn't let them take advantage of her…

'_Just like **he** did…'_

"STOP IT!" That time she felt her throat burn into life as she screamed at the floor.

Silence. She froze, lifting her eyes at a snail's pace only to have them met by six others, all staring at her with an equal degree of bemusement.

"Can you not curb your primal behaviour for five minuets? I know it something to have actually have you here with us without trying to tear ether Sister Wolf or myself apart but can you at least be quiet? In case you hadn't noticed, we are in the middle of something and can do without interruptions from you!" Virgil saw the lip and moustache twitch with simmering rage as Parker tried to keep his voice low and level. From the glint in his eye, she could tell that he was very tempted to march over and clip her one smartly across the ear for her impudence.

She went to back down but something stopped her, jarring the gears in her legs. Why should she take that from him of all people? She owed him _nothing_, in fact, all he'd cause her was painand hurt and she'd gone and given into him so easily.

'_Just like you gave into** him**…'_

For a second, reality blurred and Parker shifted into a father of a different kind. In the space of a lone moment, that straw moustache was replaced by day old stubble that was the colour of dirt. The glasses were gone and the light hair had been pulled away like some discarded wig, revealing the scruffy, black hair beneath. Suddenly, Angela was back in the living room, staring at the back of a chair with that kitchen knife gripped tightly in her hand.

She didn't need her sub-concise to will her on this time.

"BASTARD!"

The girl lunged at the man, not caring that the roar pealed the skin of her throat and the tinge of blood was slowly creeping into her mouth. Right now, the only thing in her world was-

_CRACK_

Pain exploded in the side of her face as something slammed into it without an ounce of restraint. The force of the blow set her stumbling off course and crashing into the red carpet as she reeled back from the blow that had seemingly come from nowhere. Parker just looked down on her with a sneer, the heavy volume that Claudia had been reading gripped tightly in his shaking hands as she gasped and wheezed, eyes rolling as she tried to make sense of the sharp ache. Richard's eyes narrowed into dangerous slits. This creature made his stomach turn. To think, Claudia thought this rag of a human was even worthy to partake in the salvation of man…It made him want to be sick.

"Now, Jobe…" Claudia watched Parker's back rise and fall with each breath as he sagged, the fight draining from him as he let the book fall from his hands and clatter noiselessly against the padded floor. Worry played with the corners of her mouth as her hand toyed with the idea of trying to comfort the man but thought better of it. She'd never, in all her long years in the Order, seen him lash out like that…

Parker straightened up and continued. "Are we all going to do this the easy way, or the hard way? It's up to you…"

Jobe looked at the two. Parker's tongue darted nervously across his lips and he seemed more like an eager child than a fifty year old priest whilst Claudia just regarded the man with her normal, cold indifference.

Just what the hell could these two actually do if he chose to turn his back and walk straight on out of there? Better yet, what could those two do if he chose to extract his bloody revenge on the pair?

Jobe grinned and gave his answer in the simplest way he could.

"Fuck. You."

Claudia felt the muscle in her jaw jump. Next to her, Parker sighed; a noise that was more tiered than angry.

"Very well…" He plucked his glasses from the bridge of his nose. Virgil watched as he let them fall to the ground and bounce off the open paged of the heavy book that had smite her, killing the notion of rebellion only seconds before. A cold dread filled the empty void it had left. Very quietly, she began to crawl back towards the pillar.

"Maybe…" Parker continued as his fingers reached for the row of buttons that adorned his shirt and slowly began to un-weave them. "You will change your mind once you see the true power of our faith." Jobe gasped as the shirt fell open while Virgil whimpered quietly at the sight of the priest's bear flesh. There was no reaction from Claudia as he shrugged of the top, letting it float slowly down-wards to keep the book and discarded glasses company. "Can you give me an amen to that, Sister Wolf?"

"Amen." She echoed, but Jobe hardly hear the words, for his eyes were glued to the preacher's exposed torso. Etched in the brown-red of dried blood were a whole library of symbols and unfamiliar words that were sketched across every available inch of skin. Jobe felt his stomach jolt when it hit him that none of it had been written or tattooed on, for each and every one of those occult drawings and lines of scripture had been carved deep into Parker's flesh.

"Oh my god…"

The priest gave Jobe one last wolfish leer before turning to his black and white accomplice with his hand out expectantly. In it was placed an extravagant knife that was for more elaborate than any implement you'd find in a kitchen draw but just as sharp.

Virgil shrunk into the pillar and watched with a single eye over her shoulder as she tried to crawl into an even smaller ball. Someone was praying in shaky and the girl quickly scanned the church to see who it was, only to realise that it was herself.

Jobe stepped back and tried to swallow but his throat stuck together. He'd tempted fate with hubris and it had retaliated with nemesis. He flinched further away as Parker shot out his empty hand, holding his palm face down while his fingers stretched madly as if they were trying to rip themselves apart from one another. The grin was still on the priest's face, and it was there as he drove the knife straight through the top of his hand and out the other side.

- - - - - - - - -

.A.N- I know, as places to end this chapter, that was a pretty crappy one. My appologies.

SlapDash- Yes, you were right about that. I must confess that I've become dangerously obsessed with that fantastic series and the name of the opening song jumped to mind when I was trying to name the last chapter.

Again, my thanks to you all.


	49. Sin's of the Father part 1

Ah, that took way too long to get done. Please, accept my appologies and I hope this was worth the wait. The rest of this chapter should be up sooner.

Chapter 42: Sin's of the Father

Part 1: Revelations

Jobe clapped a hand to his mouth. Despite all he'd seen in the thirty-one hours since this horrific odyssey had begun, nothing had made his stomach turn quite like that. Shocked dumb, the man stared wide eyed at Parker who was still grinning ear to ear despite the knife hilt standing proudly out from his unwavering hand.

"Oh my god…" He rattled, the gag of words barely making it through the criss-cross of fingers strapped over his lips.

"Your god?" Parker tilted his head to one side, looking so sure of himself that it almost hurt. "Your _god_ is nothing but a myth, a fairy-tail cooked up by men who wanted to rule the world through fear and power. Tell me, my boy, when has your god ever dained to show his face?" He paused, raising his free hand to his ear. "Is that never I hear you say? Have you ever even once wondered why that was?" He paused again, waiting for an answer Parker knew he'd never hear. "Because he dose not _exist_."

Jobe tried to ignore the lead weight that had settled in the depths of his churning gut.

"So how can you say that your god is real after that? I don't see her curing the lame and walking across water…"

He felt himself begin to falter as he noticed Claudia's slowly shaking head.

"Don't you see yet?" She began mournfully. "This town is more than enough proof to justify Her existence…"

Jobe must have been pulling a particularly 'what the hell' expression for the woman sighed, almost allowing herself to roll her eyes in frustration. "It shares her almighty power for the gods of old have held sway over this sacred land for longer than any of us can even begin fathom. They have left their mark upon Silent Hill, and even if it may only have a mere fraction of Her capabilities, you cannot deny the divinity of it."

"You'd call those monsters out there divine?"

"Of course I would. They have been created in the image of man's imperfections and doubts, showing us our faults."

Jobe snorted.

'_I wouldn't call some brainless eyesore that's sole purpose was to eat anything that moved holy…'_He muttered bitterly to himself, but Parker must have seen his lip twitch.

"I sense that you still lack the faith that you so desperately need, my boy." His eyes switched from Jobe to the long trickle of ruby blood that spiralled down the knife's serrated edge, collecting in a fat, liquid sphere at its tip. "I think a little demonstration of the power you so readily mock is in order…"

The droplet of blood finally gave to gravity and hurtled towards the ground, hitting the carpet with a soft 'plip'.

"Behold, as I am re-born in Her faultless image…"

Parker grinned with unbridled ecstasy.

"I want to hear you _scream_ hallelujah."

There was a pause, and in the second it took the dark spot to soak into the thick carpet, horrid suspicion dug its nails into Jobe's back and turned him stiff. Something very, very bad was going to happen. Suddenly, the man wanted to turn tail and run screaming from the church before whatever was coming to pass caught up with him and tore him to bloody shreds. Hell, even the lazy, heavy air seemed to have cracked into life and begun racing towards the sealed door in a desperate attempt to flee before all hell broke lose.

But then, it did before anyone could escape.

Virgil had clambered to her feet, still gripping her pillar as if it were some sort of saviour when she felt the carpet ripple between her toes like solid water. She gasped, but the sound was mercilessly drowned out by wet tear as something burst through the floor beneath Parker, only the floor never truly broke as it ruptured. Instead, the carpet rose up, splitting like taunt skin as a hump of black tendrils ruptured rose up in a towering mass and effortlessly engulfed the man who stood at the centre of the writhing mass. He didn't even flinch as it swallowed him whole, sinking back beneath the carpet just as suddenly as it had come and leaving not a trace of its existence. The red carpet rippled again like a pool of blood as it flattened out and the calm returned.

Jobe heard the odd moan that creaked up his throat as he stared at the spot where Parker had stood only seconds before, blinking furiously as his brain re-played the Father's final moment's again and again.

That couldn't have just happened…

"Wha-" The words came out in a jumbled mess. Jobe looked desperately at Claudia who'd somehow managed to retain her cool despite the fact the floor had just _eaten_ her co-conspirator as part of some obscure ceremony. "What the _hell_ just happened to him?"

"He has returned to the dust, just as God did once she created Paradise and like her, he will rise again. Once you behold this final miracle, you will have no choice but to accept your pre-ordained place in God's resurrection." Her gaze dropped, softening as it fell away. "I am truly sorry that you will have to go through this, but you have left no other option open to us."

Jobe would have laughed at her right there and then if she hadn't sounded so sincere. However, even if he could, he never got the chance.

"What's t-t-that noise?" Virgil moved away from the pillar, her wide and fearful eyes trying to look in every direction at once, trying to settle on something that just wasn't there. Jobe opened his mouth to ask the girl what she was on about but no words ever left his hanging jaw for within seconds, he could hear it too.

The sound was so quiet that even the soft rustle of his own breathing overwhelmed the almost inaudible buzzing hum. Where was it coming from? Jobe looked over his shoulder but saw nothing save the old, familiar interior of the church smiling warmly back at him, trying to ensure him that nothing was out of the ordinary.

He didn't have to concentrate quite so hard on the sound to hear it now; he could even begin to make out some of its detail. It wasn't a buzz as the man had first though, but rather a muted scream that sounded as though someone had twisted it out of shape until the voice cracked under its own warped distortion like feed back on a faulty microphone.

Virgil flinched at it, her hands itching to plug her ears but stayed stubbornly at her side. It was defiantly getting louder. Jobe suddenly found his mind lingering on the memory of a train station and how the slow rumble of an oncoming train would slowly fill the cramped platform as it drew nearer and nearer…

What was going to come out of the tunnel this time?

Claudia closed her eyes and tilted her head back, absolved by the wail that had gestated to a painful volume as she locked her hands in prayer.

"He returns to us…" Was all she managed to sat before her voice was smothered by the ever growing scream that seemed to be coming from all directions at once, bombarding those with in the church with its rising shrike. Suddenly, it was clearer than before, as if the screamer had been yelling into a pillow that had suddenly been ripped away, letting the hideous sound reach its true pitch.

Something shifted in the corner of Jobe's eye next to his foot. He looked down and felt the breath catch in his throat as his eyes focused on the floor, swelling in their sockets. Something was rising up from it, the red of the carpet rolling off the writhing form like liquid wax as it pushed itself up through the floor like it was nothing more than water.

It was a face, but not like any that belonged to any normal human being.

Jobe stepped back, trying not to look at the gnarled features that were a misshapen parody of Parker's as withered, twig like fingers dragged themselves through the crimson fabric only a foot away from the still rising head, snapping at the air with spasmodic jerks as they struggled to latch onto anything.

Gasping like a fish, it pushed itself up from the carpet on broken hands and strained against the floor's grip as it wheedled yet more of its twisted form through. With each passing second, yet more of it would emerge as the red trickled down it like blood off a new-born. His skin, once so full of colour had become spotted with dark patches of rot and hung emptily from his bones in hollow folds like some living robe, hanging between legs that had lost all their meat.

But it wasn't like he needed them to stand any more.

The vines of stringy muscle that had drugged him under now held him up, sprouting from random points of his body like confused umbilical cords, connecting him to whatever it was that lurked under the church's floor boards like an unborn child to its mother. They slithered up through the floor, pushing the monster up until its limp feet were free of the carpet's watery grip and hovering inches above it.

Parker slowly raised his arms out, the muscles twitching as the vines guided them into place and all the while, the thing that had once been a man still howled. Dangling like that, he looked like a hideous mock of Christ on the Cross, and that was more than the man before him could bear.

Jobe shirked back, tripping over his feet and fell backwards shrieking.

"Ohgodohgodohgodohgod…"

"Behold, see the power of our dormant God and renounce these foolish misconceptions you hold so dear!" Claudia cried, the lunacy of unbridled joy creeping into her voice as it crackled with excitement.

Parker lowered his broken head and, for the first time since he'd risen like some decaying plant from the carpet, took in Jobe as the man desperately tried to scramble away from the thing that swayed above the floor as if caught in a nonexistent breeze, but his hands and feet could never carry him fast enough. When those two, dull orbs locked on to Jobe, he screamed for all he was worth as the glassy eyes, void of the liveliness that had once filled them raked over him. Just the feel of them on his skin was enough to make every bit of it crawl as if those cold, slimy vines were wrapping around him, slithering like a horde of worms as they probed and inched their way over every bit of flesh. The bile rose in his throat and it was all Jobe could do to stop his watery gut from chucking its content back out through his mouth.

The man groped madly for the sword he dropped as he'd fallen to the floor but all his blind hand could find was empty fistfuls of air and fabric.

Parker glided forward, the tendrils slithering through the carpet that melted before them, rippling as they carried their monstrous load towards Jobe. More sluggishly pulled themselves up from the floor around the fallen priest as he closed in on the quaking man, reaching out for him with withered arms that were nothing more that bones, the knots of fingers at their end twisting and writhing as they eagerly explored the air for its prey.

One tendril budded next to his hand, licking the air as it tried to find something to lock on to. Jobe managed to tare his eyes away from Parker's hideous form in time to see it brush against his hand, wrapping itself tightly around his wrist like some fat leech as the coil tasted the warmth of his skin.

It felt even worse than he'd imagined.

The slick membrane of the tendril bulged and tensed as the muscles within it drew an ever tighter hold around his hand until the bones within grinded together, but oddly, Jobe felt no pain…

In fact, he didn't feel anything.

His hand may as well have died, for the nerves that should have been screaming as they were crushed together had fallen silent under the tendrils touch. The only thing that remained was the coldness of their touch…

Oh god, were they cold .It felt as though his hand had been plunged into a bucket of ice, and slowly the sensation began crawling farther up his arm, muting the limb as it went.

Bit by bit, it was killing him. Jobe forgot all about the sword and screamed. In that moment, all the concise thoughts ravaging his brain shut off as it sub came to the animalistic urge to survive. Panic welled, threatening to split his skin. He had to get away.

Now.

A vein wrapped itself round his shoe, dragging him ever closer to the leering form of Parker. The freak now lent over him, suspended by the army of swaying coils that danced slowly around the preacher. A gnarled hand shifted into Jobe's vision, only inches from his face, the gnarled and knotted fingers splaying out as they drew closer and closer to him. Jobe yelp, the sad, pitiful sound catching in his throat as he strained against the un-dead vines that had somehow found their way around his neck. This was it, when that hideous, misshapen hand laid itself upon his face, it was all going to be over-

A streak of movement flashed in his peripheral vision, a roar and…

Suddenly, there was a shaft of metal protruding from Parker's face, jutting straight out from the centre of his features that were shaped in a barely recognisable look of utter confusion. Slowly, thick, black blood began to ooze and well around it. The coils froze as if static with the shared shock of their master.

Jobe blinked. His heart slowed from the frantic gallop it had been racing at. Gradually, he brought himself to break away from Parker's face and follow the sharp slice of metal back over his own head until he found himself staring up at Virgil's hand, shaking as it gripped the kantana's hilt.

"I won't let you…" Her trembling voice faded as her body slumped, exhausted and spent. "Nobody could deserve this. Not even him." Sluggishly, she pulled the sword back, the tip slick with blood as she dragged it from the mass of flesh and bone. Jobe flinched as it hit the floor with a heavy 'thunk'. For a moment, everything was blessedly still, until…

"You FOOL!" Claudia spluttered as her clenched hands shook. Her eyes narrowed into two livid slits as she started towards the pair. "Do you have any idea what you have done?" She glanced desperately at Parker's wilted form but stir it did not. "You," She aimed a vehement finger at Virgil. "you have hindered God in such a way that now, she may not be able to bring about Paradise. I gave you something, something wonderful; I gave you a way to serve mankind but through your selfishness, you have damned us all by perverting Envy's-"

A heavy, rusty groan cut through Claudia's voice like a knife. The woman's rant came to a crashing halt when it struck her that neither of the two scraggy humans before her had opened their mouths. Wide eyed, she spun to look at the frozen sculpture of twisted coils and limp limbs to her side…

Only, they weren't so still any more.

Parker twitched, another grunt spewing from the gory mess that was his face. It strained, stretching out its ragged appendages to an almost impossible span as something began to bulge in its throat. The groan cut off wetly as the lump grew, stretching the skin around it until it was fit to rip.

The bile rose in Jobe's throat as he watched the twisted man's spindly body arch back and jerk back into life, and all the while, that hideous lump expanded like some out of control tumour. Jobe clamped a hand over his mouth in an attempt to hold the sick nausea at bay.

'_Oh god, it's going to-'_

_**RIP**_

Parker's throat ruptured, erupting in a shower of gore as the thing swelling in it finally burst through with a high, grating scream. Jobe felt his pupils dilate to the size of pinheads as the crimson mist cleared and his eyes were able to decipher just what it was.

Another head…but this one had discarded any of the human features its predecessor (which had been reduced to a stringy pulp of bone and tissues, the soggy regiments of it hung around Parker's neck) had retained.

Smooth, taunt skin covered the head that seemed to just be an extension of its neck and two tiny, black eyes stared out from the column of skin, blinking the blood out of them. Asides from that, the only other feature on its face was a row of needle like teeth that glared at the world from behind a pair of pulled back lips.

"My, that is so much better!" it crowed in a voice that made Jobe cringe. It sounded like there was a buzz saw or something at the back of Parker's throat, cutting the words as the tumbled out of his inhuman mouth. What made it even worse was that the Southern twang was still audible, something that forced the man to remember that this twisted creature before him had once been a man.

The head/neck twisted, landing on Virgil as it grinned insanely.

"It would seem that you do have some use after all. Remind me to thank you for your most wonderful assistance when this all over…" It said in its mangled voice before hurling a knotted mass of vines at the girl like a balled fist. She didn't even have time to twitch as the huge blur smacked into her like some organic wrecking ball and sent her flying into and through the nearest row of pews with a dry crack of wood.

Jobe stared wide jawed at the wrecked bench. That thing, it had tossed her like a rag-

"What are you doing!?" Claudia too stood staring in disbelief at the wreckage of fractured wood. "Don't you realise just how important that girl is to us? If we lose her, why, you could have jeopardised everything we have worked so hard to achieve! Without all the angels to carry the burden of man's sins, how can they all ever hope to enter Paradise?"

"Oh yes…" The creature called Parker purred, straightening up and letting the tendrils raise it a little higher into the air. "The salvation of man…how utterly careless of me, I'd almost completely forgotten about that…" Claudia frowned, suspicion rising with in her as she watched her co-conspirator from the corner of her eyes. Was it just her imagination or was there a harsh, mocking note in his voice?

"Have you gone utterly mad? How could you _possibly_ forget about our aim?" She asked softly, trying to hide the growing anxiety that threaded to burst from her mouth and betray her.

The creature swivelled, turning on her.

"You, of all people, question _my_ sanity? Oh, Sister Wolf, that is so very rich…" Something malicious glinted in those coal black eyes as it looked down on the woman. He almost couldn't stop the laugh bubbling at the back of his throat from bursting through his inhumane jaw when he saw how sick with livid fury she looked.

_snap_

"What the hell are you talking about!?" The crack was almost audible as Claudia's tether finally broke with a brittle crunch….but it didn't rattle Parker at all. Instead, he just placed a gnarled finger on his chin in a disturbingly human motion and shook his head at the bristling woman.

"My poor dear, how long is it going to take for your thick skull to absorb the simple fact that you, much like our dear Jobe, have been utterly duped."

The vicious glower melted.

"What?" She asked in a low, quiet voice.

"Oh, I'm really going to have to explain this to you, aren't I?" The creature cocked is smooth head to one side as it delivered a sickly, patronising smile that one might give a child who had just proudly stated that two and two always make a five. "You see, my dear Sister Wolf, after that somewhat disturbing speech you delivered to the higher members of our Order, we decided that something had to be done about you and those nasty, wayward beliefs that were rotting away your brain. After all, you'd just displayed to us the full extent of your insanity by suggesting that even the lowest, most pathetic excuse of a man had the right to walk in _our_ promised land!" The creature thumped its chest indignantly, the last few words it spoke disintegrating into a snarl dripping with bitterness. "Such blasphemy! Why should those disgusting creatures that live in sinful ignorance be allowed a chance at redemption, especially if Paradise is a land reserved for only those who believe in it? Your father, Alessa bless his soul, was right about you, you _are_ nothing but a deluded fool! How could you possibly believe that God would open her arms to the flocks that turn their back on her and scorned her holy name?"

"…" Claudia looked as though someone had just punched her square in the stomach as she grimaced at the volley of words. "But- Every thing you said…I..I thought you believed-"

"HA!" Parker rocked his head back and laughed. "Can't you see or are you as resilient to the practically blinding truth as our dear Jobe? It's soooo painfully simple. My dear, even though you may be something of a thoroughly bad apple, the Order still had a use for you and that wonderful gift you possess. After all, what a waste it would be to let the one person who had the power to located God slip from our grasp..."

Jobe would have thought it impossible for the pallid colour in the woman's skin to fade any more, but with each passing sentence, a little more leaked out.

"So," Parker continued, grinning like a shark. "The big boys decided that if they couldn't make you follow orders and wedge your head up out of the sand, they'd play along with this bizarre fantasy you'd managed wrap yourself up in."

"No…" The woman shook her head in dumb disbelief, as if to rip it free from the iron grip of Parker's words.

"Oh yes," He drawled, enjoying the hiss of the word against his cracked and rancid tongue. "And do you know what they did, my poor, little, misguided wolf?" Claudia couldn't even find the words to answer with. "They appointed someone to feed you the repulsive trash that you were spurting out and dying to hear other's say until your lie seemed to become the absolute truth that you'd always dreamed it to be. That someone was me."

The woman's jaw jutted sharply as she staggered back. Parker might as well have hit her over the head with a sledge hammer for her mind was reeling at a nauseating pace as it tried and failed to come to terms with the harsh facts that had just been crammed into it.

It couldn't be true, it just couldn't…

She looked up at the monstrosity, mad desperation dancing within her pleading eyes.

"But…what about the Sin's? Was that just another deception you played me with, yet another lie you manipulated me with?"

"Ah yes, the sin's…" Parker's jet -black eyes rolled back in their sockets. "You've finally managed to hit the nail on the head. I must admit, they were my own ingenious invention." His lips stretched that little bit further as he giggled like an old, rusty gate begging to be oiled, his skin practically oozed with self-satisfaction. "God, I still can't believe just how readily you swallowed that particular fabrication…"

"Why…" The woman swayed, her ragged sentence barely able to be heard above the wet hiss of the infinite vines slipping over each other as they writhed with restlessness. "Why tell me that it was necessary to bloody my hands…"

"To tell you the truth," The monster's voice drawled with a cruel, forced gayety that seemed so out of place coming from a mouth filled with razor blades. "I was having too much fun watching you suffer with each soul this town corrupted. I couldn't get enough of seeing that nauseating compassion of yours forcing you to weep for total strangers as they disintegrated into nothing but inhuman shadows, and the fact that you believed you were doing it to build some perverted version of our paradise made it all the sweeter. I swear, at times I was having trouble keeping a straight face-"

"You mean I went through all that just so you could make fun of her beliefs?" A cold voice that had been silent all the while sounded, speaking each word with a deliberately slow pace. Parker tossed a gaze over his shoulder to see Jobe staring at him with eyes practically aglow with malice and fists strapped to his side just twitching to tare apart the first thing they could get a hold of. "Was everything I went through some fucking practical joke?"

The creature clicked its tongue impatiently and waved its skeletal, withered hand at the seething man as if Jobe were nothing more than a bothersome fly buzzing around its smooth, featureless head.

"Don't be stupid, my boy. Do you really think I'd waste my time constructing such a detail plan if it were just to carry out vengeful retribution on our ignorant friend here? Don't insult me with that." Parker turned, gracing Jobe with his (almost, but from the unenthusiastic tone in his voice, anyone could tell he would rather resume breaking Claudia down into pieces until they were so small, the human eye couldn't even detect them) undivided attention. "No, there was a point to your suffering. You see, this town and our God are linked through forces even the likes of I cannot understand completely. As one strengthens, so dose the other. Easy as pie, huh?"

Jobe opened his mouth but didn't even get a chance to answer before Parker was off again.

"Now, this here town feeds on fear and pain, and as you experienced, it will exploit anyone it thinks it can leech dry until there's nothing left but a cold, empty shell. If want to see an example of this, just look to those broken benches yonder." Parker jerked his head in the still motionless Virgil's direction, who lay in a tangled mess amongst the wreckage. "If you linger here to long, why, you might just end up as just as the very thing you were trying to hide from, be it you're burning jealously, incurable gluttony or even heated wrath…" Jobe felt his lip twitch as he listened to the beast's oily words.

It had all been for nothing. Once again, he'd been living a total lie.

"So, Envy, you really aren't needed at all anymore. Sure, it was a barrel of laughs to watch you have to come to terms with what it is that lurks beneath your skin, but to tell the god's honest truth, all that happened to you was a taster of the damnation that awaits the rest of the atheistic pigs out there when the time comes for the worthy to ascend to paradise." Jobe gritted his teeth, the bone white pillars squeaking over each other as something hot and red bubbled seared within his chest, threatening to burn a hole right through it. The monster turned its spiny back on Jobe with a high-pitched snort that was rotten with false sweetness. "Heh, no hard feelings I hope!" It laughed.

Claudia stood stock still as her world lurched violently.

"You used me…" She murmured weakly in a little voice that had been stripped of its former self-assurance. With one sharp tug, Parker had ripped away everything she'd held true, desecrating each and every hope that had fluttered within her.

Had she really wanted someone to believe her that much?

Her eyes fell on the form of Jobe, who fidgeted with wrought agitation behind the suspended preacher. Something balled tightly within her gut, threatening to make her gag.

What had she done? How many people like Jobe had she ruined by blindly following Parker's false lead. She'd put so much blind faith in the man, and for what? To be struck by the aching revelation that he was just like all the others, only that he'd chosen to hide his mocking smiles from her in order to use her to his own means.

"I'm afraid that's true." The soft words snapped her from the turmoil of her mind. The woman looked up in time to see Parker towering over her, the compassion on his face obviously forced before it splintered like broken glass into a bare naked grin that reeked of malice.

She felt sick standing in his cold shadow.

"And, as much as it pains me to tell you, you've more than outlived your usefulness. You have lured God here and made sure that her arrival will be inevitable. I'm sure the Order will be pleased with your selfless service." He paused, amplifying the leer that twisted his face until it became something truly horrible.

"Good bye, Sister Wolf."

The woman didn't even bother to move as the floor beneath her erupted with coils, and no scream escaped her lips as they wrapped around her in a hold so tight that it threatened to snap all the bones within her like china. Even as they dragged her down through the floor they'd sprouted from, she still didn't put up a ghost of a fight.

How could she when she knew so very well that she deserved damnation?

A/N: it seemes that everyone's getting screwed over by somebody else in this...

Yet again, I would like to thank everyone who has endured my bad spelling up to this point.


	50. Sin's of the Father part 2

I'm so sorry, this is going to be a three parter...THEN there'll be one final chapter and an epilouge. I promise that this will end. one day. prehapse.

Chapter 42: Sin's of the Father 

Part 2: Ascension

Jobe yelped, jumping back as the tendrils shot up from the carpet, hissing as they leapt into the air before coming crashing down on Claudia. The woman didn't even flinch as they snapped into binding loops the moment they collided with her and in the space of a single, lone second pinned her so tightly that Jobe expected to hear her crack like glass within their iron hold. She was still wearing that distant look of sick defeat as her writhing captors began to retract into the red pool of fabric that had born them, dragging her down with them. The crimson surface rippled like thick water as it greedily swallowed her up, inch by inch.

Still, she did not move, her unfocused, disconnected eyes staring blindly into space.

It was only when the floor lapped over her black shoulders that a ghost of their former life sparked dimly in them and she brought herself to look up at the suspended Preacher. The look she gave him as she sank was a mess of emotion.

Fear…

Hate…

Disgust...

Self-loathing…

Disbelief…

Hurt…

Each wrote itself before melting as another took its place. While the carpet rolled into her eye sockets, the two orbs of blue fell on Jobe and said the simple words the woman could no longer speak.

'_I'm so sorry'-_

The submerged coils gave one last yank and she was gone. The carpet rippled and finally stilled.

She may as well have never been there at all…

Jobe stared at the spot as something jarred in the back of his throat. How many people was he going to have to watch fall and be broken by this town? Despite his hatred he so rightly felt for his pale tormentor, he couldn't suppress the pity that mewed inside him. She, a woman who lived in a world as black and white as herself, had been used, manipulated and finally discarded. In his heart of hearts, Jobe knew how much that particular sting hurt.

"Good riddance" sneered Parker, shattering the morbid silence that held the church. Jobe blinked as the grating voice pierced his cloudy world of though like a fog horn and looked up at the swaying creature. He could practically feel the self assured air radiated out from Parker's twisted form and singe his skin with its egotistical heat. It was enough to make his blood boil.

"You monster!" The hiss escaped through his teeth like steam out a pipe. Without realising it, Jobe bent low as his hand sought out one of the long chunks of wood that littered the floor following Virgil's short lived flight into the pews. "How many people are you going to use before you're done? When will it be enough?"

Parker just watched him with dull amusement.

"When will it be enough?" He goaded. "My boy, it will be enough when it's enough. This town has an unfathomable capacity to swallow up pointless, wasteful souls such as your sinful self and the more it consumes, the mightier it and our lord become. When she comes forth, why she will not recreated this world as our weak minded friend so foolishly believed, but will _destroy_ it, wiping it clan of your sin and damning you for it."

A splinter slipped into Jobe's skin as his grip on the long, wooden shard tightened but the man didn't notice.

"Don't you see?" Parker levelled his sleek, serpentine head at the man, stretching out the last word. "There's no way you can win. Why will you not just make this easy for the two of us and submit. Become the monster you were fated to be and feed this town with your ill acts rather than cling onto the false humanity you hold so dear." He grinned insanely, each of the needles like teeth that stuffed his mouth glinting in the light, transforming the candle's soft ambience into something sickening. They flashed the light running along their sharp edges as he continued his privet sermon. "Or would you rather I let it gorge on your pain when I pluck it away?"

Whether it was the contence of Parker's speech, the oily arrogance that smeared them or all the man had witnessed since entering the building that was more like a madhouse than a church, something finally shredded Jobe final shred of tolerance and consumed him. He didn't even bother to try to suppress the roar that tore its way up through his throat or stop his feet from launching him forward at a mad gallop towards the monster and its army of twitching coils. The fear had gone, blasted to pieces by something that ran thought the man's veins like ret hot molten metal, pushing him on and effortlessly drowning out the little voice of reason that screamed at him to stop.

All he wanted to do was tear apart this creature, this sick, despicable ghost of a man who had seen fit to play god with the lives of so many, including himself. And, after all this, had held itself so highly and in such a blazing light of self-righteousness that _it_ suggested that _he_ were nothing more than scum…

It had to _die_.

"ARRRRRRR!"

He swung the crude bludgeon back as he leapt over the first few coils, skipping over the tendrils that licked at his shoes. He felt the air whistle past his ear as one shot out at him, missing the mark by only a bear few centimetres but still hurdled on towards the beast, chewing up the space between it and him. More launched themselves at the rampaging man from all directions as floor became thick with them, clipping his sides as they tried to stop their rapidly approaching target but no matter how many blows they landed, Jobe's frantic speed refused to bleed.

It was as if he didn't even feel the sharp sting as they flayed his battered body….

The smugness faded from Parker's cylindrical head as something wary filled those little black eyes and dimmed their spark. He hadn't anticipated such a reaction, why, he should have been able to beak the man with a few carefully chosen words. This wasn't going to stop him, in fact, in a matter of mille-seconds Jobe was going to plough straight into him and vent all that pent up frustration (which by this point, must have built up to an unfathomable volume that swelled angrily within him, just itching to find an outlet) with that crude, blunt bat.

He needed to move right now.

The roots that held Parker suspended above the ground surged beneath him, pushing him up in a wild attempt to put some distance between his holy self and the rabid man charging towards him, bat raised high.

But the retreat came far too late. He'd only ascended a matter of inched before he felt the full weight of the man bowled into his bony frame like an out of control freight train on full speed. The veins beneath him didn't stand a chance as they tried to hold him up.

For Jobe, he'd lost all sense of control at that first howl. He didn't care how deep his fingers groped as they tried to find something to latch onto and anchor him to the freak. He didn't notice the thick, black blood that welled between them like oil as they bit through the ragged skin or the tendrils that swatted at him, feverishly lashing his back as they tried to rip him off. Above all else, he didn't hold back as he drove the wooden bludgeon down on Parker's skull with every iota of strength he could muster.

It _had_ to die.

The bat came down again. And again. And again. Only a few blows in and ribbons of blood had begun to cling to the bat as Jobe laid into the screaming head with unrelenting fury. It was only when the brood of coils that had wrapped themselves like iron cables around his middle during the onslaught began to pull did his violent tempo falter, but he didn't stop lashing at the head until they'd plucked him free from their master's battered body, yanking him far from it. Before the man could even blink, one of the snake-ish horde had roped around the wrist that had swung the make-shift bat, snapping it like a dry twig. All it took was the wet pop of bone crunching and the rush of pain that exploded in his arm to stop the hollering man dead. The bat fell from limp fingers that had lost all their grip as Jobe froze up, going ridged in the vein's ever tightening grip as the agony throbbed under his skin. For a moment, a blessed quietness fell over the church, settling like snow on the motionless scene.

But then the screaming began anew, only this time it reeked of agony.

"FOOL!" Parker roared through a mask of his own decoloured blood. "You dare strike me, a man of God? Oh, be sure Jobe that I will make you rue the grave errors of your vulgar ways!" The coils diffused, weaving their way over Jobe's writhing body and in mutual unison, slithered towards the suspended man's neck. "Your passing will not be an easy one and you shall be praying to me for a quick death by the time your transgression is complete. Rest assured boy, this is something I will never, never deliver onto you." The words disintegrated into a viscous, low hiss that whined through Parker's mass of teeth, but if Jobe heard, he made no indication. He was far too preoccupied with the white hot ball of pain that had replaced his wrist and singed the nerves around it. He was deaf to Parker's words, in fact, the rest of the world seemed a mile away, leaving him utterly alone with the pain. It was only when the breath caught raggedly in his throat that he stopped the screaming and let the world come back into focus around him.

He couldn't breath.

Eye's jumped down but the rest of his head was locked into place. There was something wrapped around his neck, holding it there like a vice…

_Couldn't breath._

In the time he'd been howling, the coils had weaved themselves into a tight, constricting noose around his throat. They twitched, crushing it within their writhing grasp. Something popped.

Jobe would have screamed but the air could no longer even rattle up his wind-pipe.

"Damn you boy, let go!" Parker roared into the man's face as he whipped him in, holding him only inches from his contorted face. Jobe' watched him with eyes that were slowly losing their grip on the world before them. He saw the words come out of the creature's tooth filled maw, but its movement didn't quite match up with the sound. He saw the spittle fly from its mouth, but never truly felt it collide with his face. The beast roared again, but the words fuzzed in Jobe's ear, his starved brain no longer able to make sense of them.

Livid frustration cracked the beast's face and the coils spasmed, twisting themselves all the tighter. He pushed Jobe back, letting his flaccid body lie on the warm air as he applied all the more pressure.

Jobe wasn't even aware of the pain any more. He lay there, motionless in the grip of the tendril as they had their way with his limp body, watching the up-side down view of the church's sealed doors.

His brain had stopped yelling at his lungs to inflate, suddenly falling as silent as an empty room. It was as if it had escaping the confides of his skull and was moving out in all directions, slowly letting him come undone. It squeezed through the cracks of the door, out into the open street and air and down to a little room deep underground where less than an hour ago, the very same scene had acted itself out.

Had Virgil felt so at peace when she 'died' that time? She hadn't looked it, in fact she'd gone out kicking and screaming as if clawing on to the life that was gradually with-drawing from her was them most important thing in the whole world…

…But he didn't feel that. The whole ordeal was almost…pleasant, and a certain comfort came with the knowledge that perhaps there was another way out of the series of grief his life had become rather than submission or bloody revenge. It would be so much easier to let Parker crush him to a bloody mess and just float away…

But then why hadn't Virgil seen it that way? Could she know that the sweet lull of death offered no escape to her and all of those who sinned? Did she realise that death was nothing but a façade in this town and those who died merely 'moved on' as the preacher had so enigmatically put? Had she realised that in accepting death, she would become the very thing she'd been running from during her two year sojourn in this damn town?

If all that was so, then wasn't there a chance that the exact same thing would happen to him? Would he wake up only to find he was back in an endless cycle of death and re-birth that he could only escape by letting the worst in him win? What was stopping this from just being another tug at the strings which Parker and Claudia had dragged him by through this whole ordeal by?

Nothing.

The flash of thought jarred Jobe's listless body like a bolt of electricity. He opened his eyes, the mist clearing from them the moment the stagnant air hit them-

'_Wait a minuet, stagnant?'_

Jobe coughed as a foul air invaded his lungs down his suddenly liberated throat. It stank of wet and sweet rot, a stink that plugged his nostrils and left him gagging till he was hoarse. The coils that had been slowly choking the life out of him only seconds before had gone, leaving the skin of his throat cold and numb in their absence. In fact, his whole body was free of even the memory of their splintering grip, leaving him to float aimlessly in this…this…

Hang on, just where the hell was he?

The nerves in Jobe's eyes sparked into life but found nothing but black to fill them. He jerked his head to the left but the darkness went on with his frantic gaze, stretching just as far as it could. The mummer of panic that escaped his throat was quickly swallowed effortlessly up by the limitless surroundings.

He jerked his head to right.

Black.

Up, down, back, it didn't matter, each way looked there was nothing to great him but some deep, pitch jet void that quickly lost any sense of dimensions. Black, black, black…height and distance neither possessed any meaning in this lightless place…

So, was he dead? Was this it… an afterlife filled with nothing but a numb, empty space? Jobe shuddered, but he could no longer even feel, let alone see his limbs shake. In fact, the only thing he had left to hold onto was that high, potent reek that was strong enough to singe the very skin inside his nose. Ha to think, he was almost thankful for the queasy sensation of something passing a moist, fermenting corpse inches bellow his nostrils…

Already knowing his search would be fruitlessly vain, Jobe let his eyes race over the blackness before them once more, trying to not get _too_ carried away with the remote possibility of finding…well, anything. He sighed an empty sigh. Just as he'd guessed, the blackness wasn't quite ready yet to give up any clues as to the overwhelming stench that seemed to be the only thing the air here was. Oh well, it was probably for the best...the smell alone was enough to make him want to heave.

The man was just about to contemplate whether or not he still had the capacity to be sick when something green glinted off to his side. Without thinking, his eyes latched onto the light source ravenously, refusing to blink encase he lost it and was let to go back to drowning in this deep, never ending oblivion of black.

The two, distant points grew brighter, illuminating their dark backdrop. Jobe squinted, trying to gauge how far off the green blips were. A meter, two, aw hell, they could even be a mile away for all he could see. Of course, he wouldn't have this problem if only he had something to put them into proportion with but Jobe seriously doubted the chances of the surrounding darkness offering up anything as useful as that…

The thought barely had the time to gestate when the two dots flared, scalding their surroundings in a toxic shade of green. Jobe went to squint as the flare flooded his pupils but quickly found that he couldn't, as if he'd lost the luxury of drawing his lids the moment he'd passed into this place along with any other sense of movement.

Within seconds, he was wishing he still had that one privilege.

You see, hose two dots, they weren't a mile away, oh no, not by a long shot. They were probably not even one whole meter from the man's face, swaying ever so slightly in the darkness around them as the structure that they illuminated with their green glaze breathed in and out.

Jobe hitched a breath to scream as buzzing adrenalin pumped into his blood stream with enough force to burst every single vessel in his body. The self-concocted drug kicked in so hard that it took his brain a whole second to realise he wasn't making a single sound as his mute mouth stretched in the darkness… no, he couldn't even feel that anymore… oh god, what the hell was this?

Jobe's brain burned as it tried to salvage some sort of sense from the ever maddening situation, and all the while, his eyes, the only part of him that still seemed 'here' in this nightmare nowhere, where left to take in the sight before them. Every single detail.

The eyes stared back at him from a plane of watery, slick flesh that glinted sickly in the green light shed upon it. Asides from those, no feature broke the skin's surface asides from lines of lumpy and careless stitching that randomly ran along the face.

Jobe writhed to get away, wanting nothing more than to squirm out of site and hide in the eternal darkness that had become his world but of course, he couldn't for no matter how much he yelled at his disconnected body to move, it refused to spur into life.

So he was let to stare at the freak before him. That skin, oh god, now he could see... it were as if someone had taken a sheet of the dead, white tissue and pulled it back over the creature's forbidden face like some kind of mask. It stretched back, until that mad stitch-er who had decorated the thing's head had taken up its needle once more and sown the once living cloth to the fleshy shoulders with sloppy lines void of any order.

But surprisingly, it wasn't the smothered features that turned his nerves to water.

It was the mere fact that that this warped face that glistened like damp and rubbery meat was no strange visage. Jobe had seen it once before, a time that almost seemed like an aeon ago, back when the world had still retained some of its sanity. Jobe's stomach clenched tightly as he remembered just what it was that dream of Claudia had called it, the very thing that hovered before him now in the dark on his first visit to nowhere.

Envy.

The single word ran through his mind, leaving an icy cold trail in its wake, and all the while, the creature stared back at him with those sharp, green eyes. One of its enormous, hidden hand's (still adorned with those sharp machetes of claws) shifted up from the darkness into view, clicking its hard fingers together in a sad mockery of a 'come here' gestures as those eyes narrowed into twin sharp slits.

Just that was enough to make Jobe forget that in this realm he didn't have a voice to scream and was just about to hitch a breath when-

'_Let go… you said it yourself…it would be sooo much easier…'_ A voice, the creature's voice crooned softly, only the sound never entered his ear but budded directly within his head like some gross, parasitic weed. Its voice…its voice…oh god…

'_It's mine!'_ Jobe felt as though he'd swallowed a rock. This thing…this freak of nature…could it really be him?

'_Come on, Jobe, you know I can sort everything out. After all, didn't I do such a good job the last time you needed me?'_

Silence, and in it Jobe felt his mind begin to crack like glass under the ever building much pressure. Something hot and rancid rose in his throat and all the while the tension grew and grew, just like that thing in Parker's throat until it would all get too much and tare him apart.

'_Let me out…'_

"NO!"

Jobe tore his eyes open. The soft, furnished interior of the church stared back at him sans Envy, but something cold and tight around his had replaced the monster and was slowly drawing an ever tightening noose around his neck.

Jobe let his head (which felt as though it was filled with nothing but a substance lighter than air) loll in the tendril's embrace as the world around him slowly lost its sharpness. He couldn't hold on for much longer; his lungs sung for oxygen they couldn't get and his half-starved brain seemed to have descended into lunacy already, but if it were a choice between death and becoming that _thing_…well, he could hold on for a little longer. Hell, Virgil had managed to stave off temptation for two years.

Virgil… that reminded him, he'd never thanked her for everything she'd done for him. Well, he'd probably be seeing her again sometime soon, but now that he though about it, there were so many things he'd left unsaid…

Apologising to Grace was just the tip of a vast ice burg.

A lump clogged his already bent throat and the man could just about feel the hot tears that rolled up his forehead into his matted, tangled hair, his misty eyes half focused on the church's rectangular surface that seemed to be slowly melting into the wall around it. Oh god, she hadn't deserved any of this… He'd dragged her back here, the last place on earth that _anyone_ would want to be and bitten her head off for it-

'_No…' _The voice that occupied his head whispered like a forlorn breeze. _'That's not the real reason you turned on her.'_ Jobe would have nodded in solemn agreement if he could. There was no point in lying to himself about that, not now. After all, he'd only just managed to pull the woollen sheet of thick, blinding deception from his eyes and he didn't deserve the secure, warm comfort it brought with its embrace.

She'd dared to speak the stark, naked truth about him and for that, he'd turned his back on her. He'd forced her through this town, and without knowing it, to her death. Even though it had been Casper who had pulled the trigger and ended her short, empty life along with ripping away any dregs of dignity the diseased woman may have had left, Jobe may as well have been the one who put the gun to her head.

Hers was just another life he'd ruined through his own self-centred nature…

…through his envy.

Jobe let his eyes slip as the mist descended on them. He was almost spent. Inside his chest, his heart wheezed as it jarred like a rusty piece of machinery, the beats coming ever slower as it wound down.

He was going…

Was going…

Going…

_**SLAM**_

Jobe cracked open his heavy lidded eyes as the coils around his neck laxed, allowing the golden air to trickle down his ravenous throat. The darkness that fogged his eyes diffused and the light trickled in once more.

The sharp bang of wood on wood had been caused by the church door flying open, allowing the grey and feeble light to invade the musty interior with prying fingers that ran over everything within with the curiosity of a child.

Yet something blocked the majority of the milky brightness, standing casually in the door way. Jobe felt his eyes go wide when his eyes finally began to decipher the silluoet's hazy details.

"Well what the fuck's been going on here?"

The devil himself must have spoken…That or Jobe had truly gone mad.

-

A/N- mmm, yep, yet another crappy place to cut off... oh well, it's not exactly hard to work out who this new arrival is.


	51. Sin's of the Father part 3

This took alot longer to write than normal, not supprising considering its 9 pages of waffle. I would like to that radiohead for writting '2+25', a seriouslygreat song (yet so un-SH) that stuck with me throughout, as well as you,the reader for... well reading this much.

Chapter 42: Sin's of the Father 

Part 3: Resurrection

Parker looked up, letting the choking form of Jobe fall from his melting grip and hit the carpeted floor with a soft but harmless thud. His black eyes squinted in the hazy, intrusive light as he glowered at the figure framed in the door way. Just who the hell was this person who had the sheer ordacity to interrupt his work and pollute his fine church with such crude profanities?

And then, he recognised the shadow for who it was. Instantly, the scathing, irritable glower that had been twisting the few features he had left broke like a wave on a beach, giving way to a thin smile…though there was not one once of warmth in this expression.

"Ah, so it would seem that the whore's finally managed pulled herself out of the gutter…" Jobe jerked his head up, staring slack-jawed at the still open door and the shadow that stood there, all the while doing all he could to stop that little flutter of hope that fluttered madly inside his chest from blooming into something that would effortlessly carry him away. It couldn't be her…it just couldn't…

The shadow stepped away from the door and out of the clutches of the milky, distorting light.

Jobe felt something taught finally snap inside his chest.

She stood there, totally restored. There was no gaping hole in the side of her head, no gouts of thick blood clinging to her clothing and there was defiantly a pulse pushing it around her warm body. In fact, aside from the utterly confused expression that blatantly asked w.f.t, she looked perfectly fine, albeit a little ill. It would be very, very hard to believe that this woman was supposed to be twenty or so feet underground with half her brain splattered on the opposite wall and as dead as a doornail.

'_It would also be hard to believe that Virgil's meant to be down there with her with a noose round her neck…'_ But that was as far as Jobe's thought got before-

"Oh my god, what the fuck is THAT!" Grace shirked, stumbling back towards the door as her eyes finally adjusted to the gloom around her and took in the mutated, twisted form of Parker in all its glory. The grin he shot her just sent her scrabbling for the door all the faster.

"GRACE!" Jobe yelled as he tried to force his dead-weight limbs back into life and stumble to his feet, however, the fat coil that smacked down on his back like an iron girder quickly put an end to any hopes of that. The sea of red fabric rushed up at him as raw pain raced up and down his spine, diffusing out to every nerve and blowing each and everyone like an overloaded circuit.

He lay there, gasping like a fish left to suffocate on air. Even if the mist of ache that had enveloped him cleared enough for him to even be able of thinking of trying to get up again, the tendril that had downed him jabbed into his ringing back, pinning him to the ground.

Parker didn't even bother to watch his handiwork. Instead, all he did was let his gaze lazily trace the woman who was struggling for the door.

Struggling? Oh wait, now he saw…

The only reason that Grace wasn't out that door and running down the street like the hounds of hell themselves were after her (or something as equally nasty) was because of the large, metal canister clutched between her straining arms. It weighted her down, rendering her slow and sluggish as she lumbered through the space that should have taken her a blink of an eye to clear. However, still she stubbornly held on to it, even when most who considered themselves sane would have cast it aside and run for the proverbial hills.

Well, he'd make her regret that misconduct of judgment, wouldn't he?  
Parker felt the greasy skin around his lips shrivel back another inch or two as the tendrils around him dove back into the carpet, breaking its surface like water. Ahead of him, Grace barely had the time to flay herself back as they erupted right before her in a blur of dirty brown, criss-crossing themselves over the door way in an organic barricade that even the light beyond couldn't penetrate.

For a moment, the woman stared with gaping eyes and mouth at the twisted wall of muscle and skin that happily barred her one certified escape route; then the sense that had fled at the sight of Parker returned and she remembered why she'd dragged herself here in the first place.

She turned back to the madness. Jobe felt his breath catch in his throat when he saw the look of grim determination on her face, however, from where he lay he also was able to see a mass of coils fire past him aimed with a deadly accuracy.

For the nth time that day he found himself horsy screaming her name…

…And yet again, it proved to be in vain.

Grace barely managed to register the dark and twisting shape that suddenly loomed in her vision, chewing up the space between her and it at a terrifying rate. Not losing an ounce of its fearsome velocity, it violently bloomed into a wide sinus as the tendrils splayed apart, engulfing Grace's world of vision in nothing but dark, ugly tones. She'd probably got as far as lifting a single foot from the carpet's padded surface when the horde of coils snapped in around her, latching on to any unfortunate limb they happened to brush and snatching it in a cold, unforgiving grip. Grace bucked back, more in shock than anything but the tendrils held fast, proving just how futile any future attempt of the same nature would be.

For a moment, the scene was utterly still; Grace's stood awkwardly in a stance that would have caused anyone else to be over come by the lull of gravity and fall flat on their face, however, the coils wrapped around her anchored her upright, literally rooting her to the spot. Parker watched her, that elongated head cocked to one side and an expectant smile on his face that wouldn't look out of place on a child who was anxiously waiting for a promised reward.

Then, it finally came.

"ARRRRRGH!"

Grace's staggering brain woke up, jarred into life by the wailing of the nerves that lay just under the surface of her skin. Suddenly, she was horribly aware of the dry and nauseatingly smooth texture of the coils that bound her, but more than anything, she could feel how cold they were.

The woman rolled her head back, locking the scream that swelled behind her teeth with jaws clenched as tight as possible, trying to not let the unborn wail rip her apart.

'_so cold..'._ Her gaze slipped out of focus as that single though raced back and forth inside her head, but that word could never do justice to the icy sensation that pinned her violated body.

Grace found part of her mind deliriously swimming back to a time when she was little…oh, no older than seven… to when her school had gone on a trip to some science museum or something equally dull and nerdish. There'd been a guy giving a talk, but Grace (like most of her fidgety, inattentive peers) hadn't listed to a word he'd said until he'd rolled out this big canister. He'd drawled on about how it contained this thing called 'liquid nitrogen', supposedly the coldest thing these children would ever see in their lives and went on to demonstrate just how cold it was (as if they needed a demonstration, Grace was convinced the moment he pulled of the lid; instantly, it felt as though the canister had sucked all of the heat out of the room and froze the busy air in place) by dipping an elastic band into the strange, steaming mixture within. When he pulled it out, the band was changed. The bright, vibrant colour had been leached away, leaving nothing but a strange, shrivelled and ridged loop of hollow rubber.

That was exactly how she felt right now as the tendrils climbed over her. Dead, dead and cold…

Those sickly things that bound her jerked with a sudden violence that broke the scream loose as they tore her through the air towards their leering master at a break-neck speed. Grace dragged her head up as the static air whipped past it, renewing her high cry as she saw how quickly she was plummeting towards that twisted thing and its nest of eager coils. Oh god, she was going to crash right into-

The vines around her cut their mad, suicidal rush, killing their simultaneous speed instantly. There was a yank of momentum that through her forward, then everything was still once more.

Grace opened an eye, her features reluctant to un-twist.

Ok, so she wasn't dead.

With a cautious slowness, Grace looked up…only to come face to face with the smooth, featureless visage of Parker. Somewhere deep within her chest, her heart shrivelled up as the rush of panic that flooded her system clogged it up. Her eyes were stuck to that hideously smooth head and she found that she was utterly helpless to break the gaze with the two deep, black, hungry dots that stared back at her. Finally, it cracked a grin, the lips riding back to reveal twin rows of oversized needle like denture.

The following scream she unfurled emptied her lungs in a single blast.

Jobe forgot all about the pinnacle of twisted muscle jabbing into his back and went to through himself to his feet. Unfortunately, it had also slipped his frayed mind that his wrist had been reduced to nothing but a splintered mass of bone and his blind rescue was cut short by the torrent of white hot pain that cascaded up his arm the moment he put his hand down. A raw cry erupted from his throat as he fell back down, embracing the carpet once more.

Parker paid not a speck of heed to the now sobbing man and instead kept his attention fully focused on the woman who squirmed within his grasp.

Oh yes, he was going to leech these two for all they were worth.

"Tell me…" He softly broke in causing Grace to look up at him, squinting from the corner of a hot, wet eye. "…What oh what did you possibly think you could achieve in coming back here, eh? Is this some desperate act of redemption, hmm? Pray tell, did you actually think something as…" The words slowed as the skin around Parker's maw wrinkled back in disgusted. "…_dirty_ as yourself could breech these sacred halls and actually rescue our young male friend here?" At mentioning Jobe, he twisted the coil that pinned the man to the floor, reveling in the scream it forced out.

Grace flinched at the sound, her teeth knitting together as she tried to look _anywhere_ but those probing little eyes as they scrupulously dug into her. The coils wound themselves ever tighter, grinding the bulky canister that had got her into this mess even tighter into her leg-

Somewhere, very deep in a part of her mind that was yet to come apart screaming like a lunatic, that sharp bite of metal against flesh was enough to turn on the proverbial light bulb and light her mind with a flash of inspiration. She'd managed to keep a hold of the canister through all of this, and she could just about feel the weight inside it shift as the gasoline it contained sloshed about its battered innards…

Grace opened her eye as the cogs in her mind cranked back into place and began to turn once more.

Wait…that meant the crazy, suicidal and not to mention utterly illogical plan she'd cooked up as she sprinted to the church with that heavy metal box smacking against her leg with each stride and her bunged up lugs threatened to collapse in on their sticky selves might still work... All she had to do was get out of this goddamn tangle of frozen skin and sinuses muscle.

Beneath it all, Grace's had dove for the bulge that now filled the once empty pocket of her jeans, her fingers clawing out the object. Ha, freeing herself might actually be easier than it sounded…

8 8 8

Parker felt the shot before he felt it. He'd barely had time to notice the sleek, polished form of the hand-gun worm its way through the cords that held the woman together before something tore into his face for the second time that day. The roar of it came like an after-shock, flooding his neo-existent ears as his world sunk into red.

8 8 8

Grace fell to the ground, gripping the still smoking gun and canister as the tendril's tight shape blew apart around her. Packing them both into one cramped hand, she made a mad grab for Jobe and did her best to drag the man... well, as far away from Parker as humanly possible. However, the twisted priest did nothing to stop her, his army of coils thrashing wildly about him as he launched his head back and bellowed into the church's roof, the black hole of his gapping mouth mirrored perfectly by the bloody gorge that had replaced his right eye. He crumpled in on himself into a tight ball as he tried to over come the pain, madly digging for the bullet lodged in the shattered socket with his long and knotted fingers. The screaming melted into a wet groan as he ripped the foreign, metal body from the gory wound and vehemently threw it to the ground. It bounced once, twice, then lay totally still on the carpet, the oily black that smeared it clashing with the harsh red. Parker glared at it for a moment before the sudden quietness it him.

The whole building may as well have died.

"Grace?" His lone intact brow knotted at the silence that answered him. Well, he shouldn't be surprised. It wasn't like she was just going to through herself to him on a platter, all ready to be carved into tiny pieces…

8 8 8

"Grace"

The woman swore, leaning into the back of the pew she and Jobe were huddled behind as the beast sung her name.

"You- you came back too?"

"Huh?" Grace let herself forget about the monstrosity that was probably going to tare her three ways from Sunday for blowing that hole in its head for a moment to glance at the man next to her. God, he looked _terrible_…

"Why Grace, why come back?"

"What?" She whispered a little too loudly. "I woke up in that room and you guys, Casper, you and Angela, you'd all disappeared."

"But…" Jobe's eyes rolled languidly onto her. "You could have escaped, been free of all this pain and _shit._"

"But I couldn't have just got up and left with you still here. How the fuck would I live that down…" The words clogged into a tight little knot that jammed up her throat. Ironic, she'd done many, many things in her life that _none_ should be able to shrug off quite as easily as she did…

'_Don't think about that, not now…'_

"Anyway," She shot a glance over the back of the pew at the skulking Parker, heeding her brain's advice on not lingering on that particular thought for too long. "You and Virgil explained it enough times for even me to get that we can't just walk away from this. As much as I don't want to say it, if we ever want to go back then this is something we're going to have to end ourselves…which is just what this is for." Grace gave the brick-red canister next to her a friendly pat, prompting Jobe to let his eyes sink onto it.

"What is it?" He asked in a far-away voice as he struggled to take it in. It was as if the feverish pain had wrapped itself around his skull like cotton wool that stopped anything getting in or out without getting utterly mangled.

"I found it down at some petrol station, along with this," She motioned at the gun. "It wasn't like anyone was going to mind me taking it. Anyway, this is a can of gasoline and I swear, I'm going to take it and burn this place to the ground along with that freak-" Grace was just about to ask what the hell was that thing anyway, but the half-formed words never got the chance to leave her lips.

"And why my dear, would you want to do a thing like that?" Parker's twisted excuse for a voice cawed from deeper within the gut of the church. Grace shut up, biting her lip as she cramped up behind the wooden bench in a sad attempt to become invisible.

It didn't work.

"You know, my dear Grace," Parker drawled on, slowly gliding up between the pews. "I think I've realized the answer to that little question I left you to ponder over before all that…" He paused, letting the tension swell as the word built up pressure behind his teeth. "_Unpleasantness. _Now, before I blurt out my theory, would you care to hazard another guess? Hmm?"

Jobe looked sidelong at his restored ally in time to see the taught muscles in her jaw jump and found himself sighing, for he knew what was coming next. Parker was going to break Grace under the weight of whatever words he was cooking up and dying to let loose, pretty much like how he'd tried to break Jobe time and time again.

'_You sure he didn't succeed?'_ The little voice quietly asked in the silence.

"No?" Parker's high whine of a voice cut in. "Alright then, allow me to enlighten you if you will. I think the only reason you dragged your rotting corpse back here was not for redemption or, as heroic as it would be, to save young Jobe. In fact, I think the motivation that fueled your coming here was of an entirely self-centered nature… Can you give me an amen to that?" Parker let a pause that he knew none would fill, for Grace's only response was to tighten her grip on the handgun as the silence gnawed away at her rapidly fraying nerves.

'_He's playing us again…'_ Jobe shut his eyes, biting his lip at the revelation as his head viciously hummed. He didn't want to see this… and he didn't want to hear it either. Even though the pain wouldn't be his own, it would still hurt, inflicting a wound the shattered man didn't know if he could bare. And what would all this agony be for in the end? Feeding the monster that was Silent Hill itself, an entity that was truly more terrifying than anything born of the town's rotten soil. He and Grace… why, they were nothing more than slaves to its system now…

"I think," Parker drolled on, continuing to preach to his dumb audience. "The only reason you came back to this house of god was for reason that many do, though not usually so well armed. It is not glory you seek Grace, but purpose. You see, all your life, you've never had a reason to draw another breath and it drove you _mad_… in fact, it rotted your sanity to the point where you porously chose an utterly degrading and self destructive…career. You were probably over the moon when that letter from your doctor finally came, telling you just how limited your time on this earth was!"

Jobe shrunk back from the woman, watching her with eyes hollowed out from his mounting worry as the skin around her knuckles drained of all color, shaking as they clutched the gun with enough force to reshape the clammy metal.

Oh god, she was going to snap.

In the background, Parker chased up his words with a volley of dry laughter.

"Oh, but Grace, that wasn't what you really wanted, was it? Suddenly, it dawned on you that, in some perverse and twisted way that even I cannot possibly conceive, you actually loved your so called life. In fact," A manic grin blossomed on his face as Parker let his head loll back. "You were _addicted _to itYou couldn't get enough, so you went on polluting and corrupting hard working men like Casper. You went on, and on…"

Next to him, Grace choked as her lips raced to form a jargon of inaudible words.

"…And on." Parker halted his soliloquy, reveling in the silence left by his own beautifully crafted words. Ha, that feeble minded whore… he'd break her any minuet now at this rate, and the best was still to come…

"So you see, your coming here was inevitable. Claudia, bless that fool and all her faults, was able to se all this and find a use for you Grace, or should I say…"

Jobe grabbed his head, clawing his scalp with tight fingers in a pathetic attempt to halt was he knew was coming next.

'_Don't say it, don't say it, don't sa-"_

"…Lust"

That one word was all that it took for Grace to finally brake. The echo of it hadn't even died by the time she'd rocketed to her feet and stood aiming the gun with shaking hands at Parker, her face warped by smoldering rage.

"How much of that goddamn head of yours am I going to have to blow off before you shut the FUCK UP! Just die already, goddamnit!"

Parker didn't even bother turning his head, more content with watching the speckles of dust that lazily waltzed in the candle's ambience.

"Tut tut, such language in a place like this…"

"Screw you!" Grace snarled, jabbing the barrel of the gun at the inattentive priest with enough force to pop her arm from its socket. "And what the _hell_ do you think you're doing saying I'm- I'm some kind of monster, huh?" Jobe almost laughed as he lent into the unforgiving bench. It was uncanny, she sounded just like him when Casper had first pointed the finger and screamed 'Envy'.

"Why the fuck am I still talking to you?" Above him, Grace re-trained the gun's aim and let her teeth flash as she spoke with drawn back lips. Jobe looked up at the smoldering woman in time to see her finger draw dangerously tight around the trigger. "I should have killed you and burnt this hole down first chance I go-"

"And then what, sweet Grace?" Parker swung his head round fast enough to make the small woman jump as he eyed her with the yawning, impossible, bloody crevasse she'd created . "You were just going to waltz out of those double doors back to your sad excuse of a life? Let me ask you, my dear, do you even_ have _a life left to go back to?"

A pause…then-

"What the hell's that meant to mean?" The women asked slowly as her eyes narrowed into wary slits. Suddenly, she didn't look quite so sure of herself and the gun no longer seemed so comfortable in her restless grip. Parker looked at her for a moment more before that hideous, misshapen visage cracked into shrill laughter and collapsed into an up-turned hand. Someone might as well have told him the most side splitting joke in the world for all it seemed…

"Oh," He managed to wheeze out. "This is too much…I-I'd think it almost incomprehensible to fathom your ignorance if it hadn't been for Jobe's display of…" the words were lost in a rising howl of dark mirth and the monster was barely able to chuck out his last few words. "…Utter lack of anything close to understanding the dire situation he found himself in! Please don't tell me that you also suffer from his adverseness to the truth." He brought him self together for long enough to look up at Grace, but the look on her face which plainly stated that everything he'd barely been able to splutter out had gone straight over her head was all that it took to set the priest off roaring helplessly once more.

"Shut UP!" Grace thrust the gun forwards again as she spat. However, the action had lost all of its previous conviction, but that didn't really matter for Parker didn't see it anyway. He was far too busy trying to keep himself from rupturing some internal organ as he choked on his own laughter.

"Oh god….Jobe?" Parker straightened out his crooked back, wiping an oily tear from his pinprick eyes. "I think it's high time you brought this somewhat overwhelmed young lady up to speed. Please, before she kills me!" The changed priest hardly managed to get the last word out before his vocabulary disintegrated once more into a fit of laughter with a dry, drawn out snort. Grace watched Parker as he strived to keep himself upright, her lip drawing into an ever tightening snarl that parted to reveal clenched teeth…

But suddenly, it caught on something. For the first time since she'd thrown herself to her feet, her brain stuttered, slowing down enough to think. For a split second, her eyes darted to Jobe as her venomous expression lost its sting.

"Jobe… what's he talking about?"

For a moment, the man in question remained silent, dully staring off into the empty void of air that filled his listless gaze. Then:

"He's trying to say you and I don't have a place back where we came from… but it's mainly you he's getting at."

"Oh!" Grace's eyes flicked from the man on the floor next to her to the beast fast enough for her pupils to become nothing more that twin black blurs. "And what makes you so special?"

Jobe felt his mouth go dry as any liquid in it crawled down to his stomach, collecting in a heavy ball of nauseatingly heavy bile.

"Because…" His tongue tripped over the words. Oh god, he didn't want to do this-

"Don't be afraid," Parker softly crooned in a sing song tone, having finally got the better of his morbid sense of humor. "Just tell her, after all, unlocking the truth is such a liberating experience as I'm sure you've found!"

Jobe dropped his head and mumbled pathetically into his chest in hope it would swallow the words he couldn't bring himself to even mutter. However, luck would have it that the church's hall was quiet enough for even the deaf to hear a pin drop.

"Because… you're dead, Grace."

…

For an instant, the world stopped, grinding to a halt on its axis. The only thing that dared to move was the sick excuse for a smile that was slowly inching across Parker's face.

Then Grace laughed, shattering the silence like fragile glass. It was a horrible, high thing that made Jobe wince and want to black his ears as it racked the woman's slim form.

"You're bull-shitting me…" But Jobe dodged her gaze, choosing to let it sink deeper into his chest than look at her. Her bray of force laughter slowed to a nervous trickle. "…Right?"

"I wish to god I was... but Casper, he- he- damn it, Grace, he shot you. He killed you!"

Jobe let his pupil crawl to the corner of his eye and nervously brought himself to look at the dead quite woman. The expression she wore would have been enough to break his heart… if there had been anything left to desecrate. She looked so afraid, so small, so lost and all the while her eyes silently begged for Jobe to say this was all some twisted practical joke as the flux of emotions welled deep inside her…But then, in a blink of an eye it was all gone and replaced with something cold.

"You're full of it, Jobe…" She glared up, firing her venomous gaze at Parker as she took swift aim at the writhing mass. "You both are, and you can just go to hell!"

"My dear girl," The creature at the opposite end of the church looked up, meeting Grace's eyes with a glare that utterly dissipated it. "Neither of us, as you so eloquently put it, are full of anything. You were killed Grace, killed for the simple reason that through your death, Jobe would finally wake up and acknowledge just what crime it was he had committed." Grace's lip had begun to tremble as she held the gun aimed at the monstrous preacher, her finger clamped so very tightly on the trigger. Just an ounce more of pressure, even less…that would be all it would take to shut him up and halt the torrent of crushing words that spewed from that dirty mouth of his. "Casper just let himself get a little too carried away with carrying out the necessary act of retribution on your rag-tag band; but do not allow yourself to make the same mistakes Jobe and fall into the fatal grip of delusion. He snuffed out your life, Grace, with a single shot…"

A whimper rose from her throat and scrapped out into the open air through teeth that were to busy worrying her lips to even try and suppress the pathetic sound. The world lurched around her. Suddenly, Grace found her arms were barely able to hold up the bulky fire-arm before her as Parker's words burrowed into her like a crop of carnivorous maggots whose army of needle teeth would not stop gnawing away until everything was gone.

'_It's a lie, a fucking LIE!'_ Something hot slid down her cheek as some internal voice screamed at her to just pull the trigger and be done with it. However, with each tick of time that slipped by, that crying voice grew smaller and smaller as it was gradually assimilated by the fearful paranoia that swelled around it.

'_NO!' _This- this couldn't be right. Wasn't the fact that she was standing here proof enough that she was alive? How could she be dead, she'd been in that room and not a single shot had been fired for the whole time! Sure, Casper had got pretty comfortable with jamming it into the side of her head but that had all stopped when… when…

Blank.

There was a gapping hole in her memory, burning a great black gap in the sequence of events stored within her head. Grace blinked, running over it again and again, but each and every time she tried to play back a little more for her mind's eye, it would always clamp shut at the exact same point.

It was as if it was afraid of seeing what came next.

"If I recall correctly," Grace looked up, her head swimming as she tried to focus on the Father and repress the thumping urge to be sick there and then. "He laid the bullet into you right here…"

Jobe watched with dread, having finally pulled himself up on the pew to leave some of his apathy to wallow on the floor without him. Transfixed, he followed the preacher's skeletal hand as it ascended to the side of his head, molding itself into the unmistakable shape of a gun before resting its long fingers against his temple.

"Blam."

Grace choked. She staggered backwards as if Parker's imaginary shoot had been fired right at her, embedding itself in her chest. Without meaning to, she raised a shaking hand to the side of her head, sloppily mirroring the preacher's smooth and controlled gesture. Before she could stop herself, she let it grace against her skull and the uncontrollable fingers at its end burrow into her dirty blond-hair.

Something cold and wet greeted them, slicking her hair into clumps as if it were caked with jell.

"…no…" The sound that passed through her lips could barely bring itself to rattle the dry air as the muscles in her eyes tightened. Her fingers dug further in, ignoring the desperate cries from her brain to stop and just let it go. Deeper and deeper they went, until they found the scalp…along with the oozing hole that broke its surface.

Grace jerked, yanking her hand back as if she'd just stuck her finger into a socket. The sticky, saturated strands of hair clung to her hand for a moment longer, lashing them with bright red as she ripped them away as fast as she humanly could. Grace stared at her hand for a moment, mesmerized by the vibrant color that dyed her skin crimson. She looked at it, shocked dumb as if the familiar limb was something totally alien to her.

And then she screamed.

"What the FUCK IS THIS!" Sobbing, she desperately turned to Jobe but he could offer the disintegrating woman no answer; he was far too busy gawking at the twin blood-red stains that were slowly gestating on either side of her scalp to bring himself to say anything. Wildly, she shot a pleading glance at Parker, helpless to stop herself from shaking as the stone cold liquid began to creep down her neck with a heavy slowness.

"This, my dear Grace, is the truth. A truth that you were too afraid to accept because you could not stomach the thought of what it is you are." He spoke, his voice seeped to the point of dripping with that self righteous confidence that came so naturally to him. "A sinner; and a dead one at that!"

Grace stumbled forward, grabbing the pew that had sheltered her. How- how was any of this possible! Her brain felt like it was about to explode under the sheer pressure of the preacher's words and with each one, she could hear her fragile mind crack and splintered that little bit more. Jobe took a step forward but quickly stopped himself, his arms locking awkwardly at his sides. Just what the hell could anything he tried to do achieve anyway?

"So Grace, just what are you going to do?" Parker cocked his head to the side, his lone eye in a half closed grin as if the infectious smile on his lips had managed to spread even there. "Take the path of hardship and tribulation that you brethren sin, Envy, has chosen to walk… Or perhaps I'd be so lucky that you'd decide to do the sensible thing and just submit to God's will. I must warn you though," The light that danced so joylessly in that oil black eye clicked off as the preacher swung his suddenly cold and heatless gaze onto the man beside her, boring through his flesh as if it were as thin as paper. "You will not be able to stand up against this town and its immeasurable power for long. Your assimilation into it and our God's grand design is as inevitable as her coming…"

Jobe shuffled back as he felt the pitch-dark orb unscrupulously run up and down him again and again as if her were something that had just walked in out of the gutter while Parker's words dug in at him.

'_Don't let him get to you with all this junk he's tossing out. You made your choice and damnit, I'm going to see that you stick to it. After all, you don't want to give that creep the satisfaction of seeing you just roll over and die, do you?'_

No, no he did not. He was going to fight against this life that had been thrust at him until his last living breath left his body…

…But then, would Grace be able to muster the strength to stand with him? Looking at her right now, the man seriously doubted it.

If he'd though she'd looked ill before as they'd both said what they must have though would be their last goodbye at the motel, then she was practically dying on her feet right now. It was if the disease that slumbered within her had been awoken and its appetite for life multiplied by a factor of ten hundred. In the space of a few lone minuets, the woman seemed to have hollowed out as if everything within her rotted as it was rapidly chewed away by some festering, internal entity.

"Tick tock, Grace…" Parker sneered.

_Snap_

Grace's head cracked up, the cords in her neck bulging against the surface as her jaw locked together like the iron teeth of a bear trap. Through her tears, her eyes _burned._

Before Jobe even knew what was happening, the woman had vaulted over the pew, canister in hand, gun prone. The tendrils had barely had a chance to twitch before the shooting started.

_BLAM_

There was a dry crack. Some of the plaster on the pillar that stood behind Parker exploded in a tiny puff of dust as the bullet drove into it.

_BLAM_

The next bullet tore splinters of wood from the floor as it raked through the carpet beneath the priest's limp feet.

_BLAM_

This one bit right into one of them. Having finally found the mark, the next three came so fast that the gun's blasting holler rolled into one horrific scream.

Gut. Chest. Shoulder. Each one of these snapped back in turn as the hot metal slugs tore through Parker's battered body. His eye shot wide, the invisible pupil locking onto something in the far distance as his jaw sagged open in a tragic expression of painful disbelief. That… that bloody whore had stood up to him. How? It was never meant to end this way. They could not prevail, they-

White blazed across Parker's vision as Grace slung the canister into his face with enough force to send him crashing into the ground.

'…_They were meant to fall…'_ A voice whispered flatly inside Parker's broken skull as the lights within it slowly started to dim and the fog rolled in.

Grace looked down at the scraggy, misshaped human as it tried to work its arms in a pathetic excuse to get up.She didn't even feel a flicker of remorse as she un-twisted the (now deeply dented) canister's lid and poured the thickly scented content over the fallen monster.

"You know…" She began, her voice rising shakily over the wet splatter of gasoline against skin and carpet. "I've had a really shitty day today," The can fell to the floor with an empty, hollow thud. "And you're not helping." Parker's eye rolled onto her, the little black ball barely visible in its swollen socket. It watched as her shaking hand went to the pocket of her grimy jeans, pulling out the metal lighter and box of cigarettes that had faithfully accompanied her through out the hell that had been the last two days. "Last thing I fucking well want is you acting all high and mighty telling me that my only purpose is to put up with crap like this or whatever it is some god has planned for me." Grace opened the box, only to find an empty space staring back at her. Oh well, she'd been thinking of quitting for her health's sake…

At that though, she found herself feeling as empty as the box. Ironic, she could pour as much tar and nicotine into her lungs as she wanted without having to give a second thought to lung cancer or anything like that.

Ha-fuckidy-ha ha.

Beneath the suddenly still Grace, Parker gave out a choking laugh, blood bubbling between his lips.

"So, you think you've won? How can you say that, you've got nothing left in this world!"

"Yeah?" Grace raised an eyebrow. "Well that sure as hell doesn't mean that I'm going to fit in with your little plan for humanity because you say so. Can _you _give me an amen to _that_?"

A smile danced in Parker's lone eye as the woman flipped open the cigarette lighter with a casual flick of her wrist, watching as she sparked it and let it drop from her hand, all in one fluid motion.

"Amen." He chuckled between bloodied teeth that could barely contain the sarcasm of the final word that would ever pass his lips.

He was still laughing at her as the lighter hit the sodden carpet beside him, setting both Parker and it ablaze in an explosion of orange, white and blue.

A/N- and so ends the climatic battle of this tale. I hope you had as good a time reading it as i had writting it (i don't think i could ever get sick of breaking charaters down into itty-bitty peices. gah, i'm so morbid)

E.P.O- No, this isn't an AU fic. All willbe reviled in the up and coming epilougue.


	52. Fading to black

Christ, I listend to Jhonny Cash's 'Hurt' over sevently times while writting this out.Well, here we go... personaly, I dare to think this may be one of the better chapters.

'_We climbed and climbed until we caught a sight,_

_Beyond a rounded opening, of store_

_On store of things of Heavenly delight;_

_And we emerged to see the stars once more.'_

_-Dante's inferno, canto XXXIV_

Chapter 43: Fading to black

"…"

"Huh?" Grace barely moved her head an inch at the voice that sounded miles behind her as she stood painfully ridged, her eyes transfixed and locked onto the flickering destruction she'd wrought.

"I said we need to get out of here!" It came again, clearer this time. Along with the soft words, a hand gently laid itself on her shoulder, weakly shaking it in some vain hope of yanking the woman from her trance and back into the real world…

It might as well have slapped down with enough force to break each and every bone in the left side for all she felt.

For a moment, Grace just went on staring at the dancing inferno that softly crackled before her; if she squinted hard enough, her dry and thirsty vision could just about make out the dark, lifeless form of Parker amidst the flames that danced madly about him as if in fanatic worship of the black and brittle corpse.

Just the sight of it was enough to make her sick. He could be as dead as winter's leaves but that wouldn't be enough to kill the bitter, goading testament he'd left behind…

"Grace, we _have_ to get out of here, this whole place is going to be up in flames any minuet now!" The voice buzzed again in her ear like some lazy fly. Finally, she turned to it, her slumped and listless joints moving as if set to run on some brain-dead, automatic setting.

Jobe shuddered as her gaze crept sluggishly onto him… no, onto wasn't the right word at all. Those two green eyes which had at one time been so bright and full of bouncing life just dully stared without seeing a single thing, slipping straight through Jobe as though he were nothing more than a transparent space of empty air.

"…ok…" She mumbled.

Jobe's hand dropped as the woman began shuffling aimlessly towards the door without question.

Good god, where had Grace gone? What was this…_machine_ that had replaced her? Jobe almost couldn't bring himself to watch her as she brush aside the withered tendrils that now limply hung over the door, now so still without their masters bidding, and step out into the weak, sickly grey light of the fading afternoon. It was like watching a

'_dead man walking…'_

Jobe tried to swallow down the bitter tasting guilt that flowered in his mouth at the thought. How could he even begin to think of judging her? She'd died while he still had the chance to live. Anyone in that situation couldn't physically be in a right state of mind, hell, wouldn't that be enough to practically destroy most people?

The man hacked a cough, serving as a reminder of the acrid smoke that was gradually tainting the musty oxygen inside the church. The flames that roared around Parker had spread out, chewing up the carpet and wooden floor at a ravenous pace while some had even begun to clamber up a nearby pillar. Seeing the scene before him, Jobe was suddenly more than aware of the beads of sweat that were slowly peculating through his skin along with the hot air that choked his lungs with each breath. He was about to turn and run from the burning place when something mentally hit him with the force of a two-by-four square between the eyes.

'_Virgil…'_

8 8 8

The girl in question had woken up a while ago but hadn't moved until now. Up until this moment, she'd been lying in a limp huddle of limbs, staring blankly off into some unknown space. _'Perhaps'_, she'd thought as the battle between Grace and Parker raged on, _'If I can just lie here and pretend I died.' _

Yes, that made a lot of sense. She could stay right there; no one was telling her to get up and none would really care anyway if what Parker said about them being 'un-needed' was true. She could just stay curled up in the sore heap she'd landed in and claim the eternal sleep that had evaded her for these past two years...

Then the fire had started.

Virgil let a half smile cross her face as she slipped on to the pew that had broken her fall. Sitting down, she watched the ever growing blaze as it rolled out across the church, plunging everything it touched into abstract, roaring orange.

The scene was all too familiar, and just like the last time, she had no intentions of leaving.

"Virgil?"

Teeth shone through the grin as her cracked lips parted. Just how much was this going to be like her sad attempt at getting away from it all in that burning stairwell all that time ago? Would Jobe pick up the part that lying blond soul (who, coincidently, had also been searching for someone who no longer existed and claimed false innocence) and _try_ to deter her from her dream of death? But then, even if she sat here until she was nothing but a pile of ashes, would she finally be able to die?

"Virgil!"

The flames licked closer.

"VER"

"What?" The whisper came so curtly, freezing the hand that Jobe was about to grab her shoulder with in mid-air.

"I…" Stuttering, Jobe ran his tongue over his dry gums. God, how could she sound so calm? This whole place was in the process of going up in a big ball of flames but she was just sitting there, acting as though there wasn't a thing wrong in the world. She might as well have been watching a past sermon for all the concern she showed. "I- I mean we should get out of here. I don't know how long this place is going to…" A low moan escaped from the network of rafters overhead as the white hot fire began to chew on them, as if to remind the man of what it was he meant to say before they'd so rudely interrupted. "...Hold up for."

"Yes, you're right." Virgil sighed contently, lolling her head back so that she could take in the searing inferno that had replaced the ceiling. "It could come down any minuet on us. You probably don't want to be here when that happens."

Jobe felt something inside him draw itself into a tight knot.

"But you're not going to still be in here when that happens either," He allowed himself a nervous laugh but it tasted so damn rotten he had to stop it almost immediately. "Are you?"

Virgil's glassy eyes rolled onto Jobe as her head lay on the top of the back rest. Still smiling, she gave her answer.

"You should really make a move." And with that, she closed her eyes, filling her lungs with the thick air that swirled about them.

The revelation hit Jobe like a tone of brick. She'd had enough. She didn't want to go on with twisted, god-forsaken life she'd been damned to. She wanted to stay here and take the burning chance of escape the flames offered and who cared if it didn't work, she could at least enjoy the faint, tangible hope of death for now…

'_No…'_

"Are you still here?"

Jobe dug his feet into the crimson carpet, his jaw locking tightly.

"Get out…" She murmured softly with eyes still closed, but still Jobe stood rooted to the spot. The voice of reason had returned with a vengeance, screaming at him to heed this perfectly good advice Virgil was giving to him. If he didn't get out of this glorified cinder box right _now_, it would be the very thing to do him in. After all he'd lived through, didn't that prospect seem a little…mundane?

But…he just couldn't. The stench of death hung too heavily on him already. He couldn't just stand here a let Virgil add herself to the toll. Again.

"How…how can you just sit there and be like that." He choked. "You spent so long fighting and running away from Parker and Claudia, but now they're gone. Don't you see? You can't just go and give up, especially not now, now it's all over. Why… that would be going against everything you've done!"

Silence, save for the soft roar of the ever swelling inferno. Virgil's back rose as she breathed deeply and creaked slowly to her feet.

"You have something to go back to. I don't." She turned to him, skulking out from behind the pew. "I've got to carry on living in this place for as long as _it _wants, but you… you're free! You can go back to a world not one of us belong to and leave this…this…" She struggled as the words began to rush from her mouth in one great gabble of uncontrollable noise. "…utter _hell_ behind you! Get on with your life. Don't waste your time on me. Can't you just let me have this one thing-"

The sentence was cut painfully short as Jobe's hand flew across her face in a sharp slap. Virgil's head snapped to one side and for a moment she could do nothing but wear a blank expression of shock, her eyes unfocused and staring off into some distant, unknown point.

"Don't talk like that!" But even before he'd got the sentence out, Jobe found the heat that had fuelled his lashing out dwindling. Quickly, guiltily he drew in the vicious hand that was still out-stretched and stiff as a back board, hiding it in the grip of his other. Oh god, why had he done that? There was no way she would listen, let alone come with him and leave the one place she'd once been so afraid of coming to… Hell, in doing that, Jobe had probably just gone ahead and fortified her belief that men were nothing but a malicious, forceful breed, out for nothing but their own gain.

"I…" She slowly slipped back to whatever plain of reality they were on, choking out the word as if they stuck in her throat like sharp fish bones. "I-I'm so s-s-sorry."

Jobe had to do a double take. He was just about to ask her what the hell she was talking about when the ragged girl collapsed forward on to him in a fit of sobs and apologies.

As he slowly lead her from the raging mess of fire that was the church, Jobe couldn't ignore the pang of guilt that dug its sharp talons into his back. It would be _wonderful_ to be able to say that he'd cheated Virgil out of her death yet again only because he was trying to make her see what was best for her; if he only didn't want to see her just give it all up and slip away into the absolving darkness that was this town.

Ha, as if.

The only reason he'd tried so hard to make her see the light was for his own peace of mind. Any more guilt and it would probably be enough to well and truly crush him under its already unbearable load.

'_How selfish…'_ A small voice whispered at the back of his mind.

Jobe didn't have it in him to tell it to shut up.

8 8 8

Jobe didn't need to look back to know they'd stopped. That old familiar silence filled the saturated air as his own foot-fall came to a stand still, bringing an end to the monotonous clack of shoes on the road's permanently slick surface. Heavily, he turned to look once more upon the two who'd been shadowing him without a word ever since the three of them had left the church far behind to burn and crumble.

"You're not coming any further, are you?" Jobe asked, already knowing what their answer would inevitable be. For a moment, Grace (who had slipped ever further into her own world of morbid thoughts as if the fog that swirled around them had suddenly grown fat and thick about her and her alone) and the girl who she dumbly traipsed behind like some small, lost child were silent.

Then, something strange happened.

Virgil smiled; not one of those drugged, false smiles that were either drenched with lunacy or the maliciousness of wrath but a genuinely warm thing despite its melancholy undertones.

It was the happiest he'd ever seen her.

"I just can't… I-I've been here for too long and you saw what happened the last time you took me with you…This place…it-it doesn't let people like me go." Virgil looked up at the low hanging grey sky, peering through her knotted, straggly bangs at the mist that swirled above them.

It almost looked close enough to touch…

"I guess I should t-t-thank you for earlier…" She went on, watching the shapes that formed and melted in the fog. "You know, for not just leaving me in there. It-it probably wouldn't have worked anyway…" Virgil brought her wondering gaze back down onto Jobe but quickly found it flitting away when she saw the almost painful grimace he was wearing. "S-s-sorry…"

"Huh? No, it's not that." The man quickly stopped himself from blurting out the cause of his discomfort to the burnt girl, after all, how could he say that the real reason he looked as though someone had just force fed him a plate of rancid meat was _because_ he had saved her?

"Do you think…" Jobe trailed off, nodding in the direction of the practically catatonic Grace. Virgil turned an eye to the soulless shell that the woman next to her had hollowed out into before looking back at the man with a slow shake of her head.

"I don't thi-"

"I can't…" the lifeless woman muttered, cutting of Virgil with a far away murmur. "I mean, I can't can I?" Grace dully turned to Virgil, desperate for some, hell, any form of confirmation, but the girl said nothing, suddenly absorbed by the over head sign that still gave a warm welcome to anyone who made the mistake of crossing into the boundaries of the town. "Heh," Grace laughed bitterly. "That's just what I though. I mean, I'm dead, right? Can't exactly go putting that on our C.V's, can we?" The words disintegrated into a fit of sniggering as Grace's fingers scurried for the crumpled box of cigarettes that patiently waited in the pocket of her jeans, but how funny it was; as she pulled the sad, cardboard structure free, that high, ragged attempt at laughter sounded so very much like crying…

Grace opened the box with shaking fingers that seemed to jerk with a life of their own as they sought the comfort of the familiar stick of nicotine and tar.

"Fuck…" She'd forgotten they were empty. Jobe shifted uncomfortably in the silence that came chasing after Grace's blunt profanity as the lonely stretch of highway fell quiet once more.

"So, I guess this is it, huh?" He tried to push a note of happiness in to his words, but no matter how hard he tried, it just didn't fit and even as he said it, he swore he could see Virgil wince at the off-key sound.

"Sorry…"

Jobe half-smiled at the girl's automatic reply as he begun to turn away.

"Me too, Angela. You guys really should be coming with me… Take care of yourselves, ok?" And with that, he took his first step away from it all. Behind him, Grace rose a hand to wave, but once it was up and hanging their in the air, it lost all certainty and dropped back to her side like a stone.

Virgil just settled with watching him melt into the mist.

8 8

'_I'm free…'_ Jobe paced on, head down low and hands thrust deep into the pockets of his shirt. _'So why doesn't it feel that way?'_

'_Because you know you belong back there with them?'_ That small, persistent voice spat spitefully back at him, sharp enough to burn a hole.

The man shrugged, bending a little lower and walking a little fast but it didn't get him away from the knowledge that it was right, which of course, it was.

Virgil had killed a man, so she remained there…

Grace had lived a lie and infected god knows how many, so she remained there…

He, Jobe, had butchered two people, the two people closest to him no less _and_ lived a lie…yet he got to walk away.

It wasn't fair.

'_Well, if it's any consolation, they'll probably throw your sorry ass in jail the minuet you get back.'_

Consolation? Right, how could spending a life behind bars ever measure up to being damned to an eternal sentence in the nightmarish prison that was Silent Hill?

Quite simply, it didn't. Not by a long shot.

_Crunch_

Jobe stopped as something ground itself into the tarmac under his shoe. Cautiously, he pulled his foot back, peering down at the road with a frown.

'_glass?'_

He looked up, his eyes catching on the little slithers of transparent crystal that lay strewn across the tarmac, tracing them as they led off into the mist and-

'_What is that?' _Jobe frowned as his gaze met the dark shape, blurred out but the banks of milky fog that filled the air. Before he could think even twice about curbing the welling curiosity within him, Jobe found his feet carrying him towards it and with each step, the mist's grip on the ambiguous object relented a little more.

This was a bad idea… how many times had he followed his impulses like this and ended up sorely regretting it? And had he ever learnt from his past mistakes? No, of course not. That was why he was foolishly going to investigate this great mass that lay on the road instead of just shrugging it of and carrying on his merry way-

Jobe stopped, his stomach taking off with a violent lurch. The thing that lay before him like a piece of dead road kill left to be picked clean by hovering carrion was in fact the wrecked remains of the very car that had carried him to Silent Hill.

He stepped closer to the upturned vehicle.

The boot faced him, the plate of thin yet sturdy metal crumpled beyond belief while the glass of the back window had all but shattered, leaving nothing but a great black void. The jagged remains that stubbornly clung to it framed the hole like the maw of some great monster.

Slowly, he took another step…and quickly whished he hadn't.

There was a break in the darkness, an interlude of pale white dotted with red that hung limply through the irregular gap that had replaced the back window. It-it-it…

'_It's her hand…'_

Jobe felt his gut heave and tremble, his eyes going wide as he recognised the slender form as Julia's. He must have stood there for a full minuet before his legs found the strength to move again. Trying not to look back at _it_ or let his mind wonder about what else might be residing in the dark recesses of the boot, he walked past, stopping only as he past the front of the car.

Something… something wasn't right. His peripheral vision had snagged on something that didn't belong in the picture as he'd tried to stride past the car without a second glance. It may have only have been a flash, but it was enough to get the muscles in his neck jumping, itching to turn and just take one very quick look.

In than moment, Jobe suddenly knew exactly how Orpheus must have felt as he stood at the mouth of the underworld, slowly driving himself mad as the question whether or not his wife was waiting silently behind him drove itself into his brain like a white hot nail...

'_It was probably nothing.'_

But still he stood there.

'_Just keep walking.'_

Yet again, he couldn't get his brain to override the ravenous curiosity.

'_DON'T!'_

But it was too late; his head had already begun to turn and all too quickly, he'd gone past the point of no return.

For the first couple of seconds, his brain blankly refused to take it in. It had to be a trick of the light or his eyes were just taking a moment to focus… But a moment came and when, and still the sight remained.

Something horribly familiar lay among the mess that was the front of the car. Cold and lifeless, it was strewn itself among the cracked remains of the windshield like some limp and listless rag doll…

Only, this doll was composed of flesh and blood.

"…no."

Jobe spun away from it, clamping his eyes shut as if his thin lids could block out the image, but it was all too little too late. Oh god, he was going to be sick.

'_Don'tthinkaboutitdon'tthinkaboutitdon'tthin-'_

But the picture of the bloodstained, grey shirt had happily burnt itself on to his retina along with that of the dark skinned corpse that filled the ragged, dusty cloths. No matter how hard Jobe tried, he could not cleans it from his mind and with each attempt to push it out, it just seemed to burn all the brighter. It was clear to him, painfully, painfully clear.

He had seen what he had seen, and it was him. There was no denying it, that thing crumpled up amongst the wreckage could be no other.

Jobe did what anyone who was forced to face such a garish truth would do. He ran away from it as fast as he could, screaming as he held his head in his hand, fingers digging in as if they could rip the image of his dead, true self free from within his skull. Blindly, he tore down the road, feet hammering on the tarmac as his head spun and buzzed. He had to-

Jobe's foot caught on something. He stumbled, missing his footing altogether and went tumbling to the ground. Unmercifully, it caught him, punching the air from his lungs.

And for a second, he just let himself lay there, allowing the sodden moisture to soak into his own grey shirt.

'_So, I'm as dead as thye are…'_ Time ticked on, but it had left Jobe far behind as it when on marching at its unwavering pace. All the man could do was let the morbid thought roll about his head, thudding off the insides of his skull. Finally, he brought himself to open his eyes… Only to find the empty gaze of the thing that had felled him staring right back.

The air caught in his throat.

Suddenly he knew. This was the thing that had run out in front of the car. This was the thing that had caused him to crash. This was the thing he'd slammed into at fifty miles per hour.

The lifeless eyes of Grace just stared back at Jobe, unmoving as they watched the revelations tare straight through him.

8 8

Grace flinched as the screaming ripped apart the dumb silence that had fallen on the strip of foggy road like light snow. Again and again the sound of welling pain came, never relenting as it shook the air.

The sound of it was enough to make Grace want to die.

Tears had begun to dampen her eyes by the time her hand locked desperately on to Virgil's, gripping it as if it were the one last thing holding her above some depthless, hungry cataclysm.

The wailing went on, and the girl made no attempt to stop the woman as she squeezed her bandaged hand ever tighter.

A.N- well, onto the epilouge, and then it's all going to be finally over... I hope the ending didn't disapoint. Long, long ago, i think i may have planed it to be a little up lifting but that just died...

SlapDash- Ah, thanks for pointing that out to me and yes, I was being English. Heh, i'm sorry for encuring your jelousy, though i wouldn't say i'm worth it. Thankyou for being such a long time reader, it's reveiws like yours that had kept me going.

Nessmk- well, i hope that ending was good enough for you. Thanks for leaving your thoughs and reading this for so long. Don't worry, I've got a couple more stories  
to churn out before I'm done (though hopful, they won't be quite as long).

E.P.O- wow, thankyou. I'm glad you think the charaters have chrater. I always worry their too flat or angst, angst, angst.


	53. Epilogue: The soliloquy of a martyr

_If I could start again, a million miles away,_

_I would keep myself, I would find a way.'_

_-Hurt_

Epilogue: The soliloquy of a martyr 

Darkness…

Pull the lids back and let the light in…

_But it hurts so…'_

Claudia shut her eyes and allowed her head to sink back down into the plush sea of carpet beneath her. However, it wasn't just the stinging that ravaged the moist surface of her eyeballs or the sense that someone had run ten-thousand volts of hot electricity directly through her body that caused her the most pain; there was something else, something raw deep inside which would take a far, far longer time to heal than simple physical discomfort.

'_Was I really such a fool?' _

…

Yes, yes she was. She'd been so desperate to have someone believe her vision that she'd gullibly swallowed Parker's pack of lies and hungrily come back for more.He'd played her for his own benefit and just tossed her aside, ripping her faith in him from her chest without even a twitch of the eye. In the space of a few minuets, he'd torn apart the beliefs Claudia had held dear for a lifetime and made an utter mockery of not only herself, but everything she stood for aswell.

Claudia grimaced, pulling herself tightly together. Ha, if only father or that odious, self-centred Vincent could see her now. He'd probably rupture something with laughter…

The mental image was enough to make her want to gouge her eyes out and leave her in the not so comforting silence of her own mind.

Where was she anyway? Was this death? The last thing she could remember was slowly sinking while the blackness gradually crept up and over her, tearing her from the world as something relentlessly pulled her down into its smothering, un-chartable depths.

Claudia would have loved to be able to say that really was the last thing she remembered before the dark closed in around her, but there was something else.

As clear as day, she could still Jobe looking with what almost seemed like a strange, hard to swallow mixture of malice and horror at her as she descended into whatever fate Parker had planned for her. Poor man. She'd committed the most heinous act against him just so she could live out a dream, a dream which turned out to be nothing more than a glorified lie, but even without knowing that that was truth, the pain she and Parker had inflicted on him was more than any one should have to bear…And, to make things even worse, he wasn't the only one who had suffered so needlessly at their hands.

They were the true monsters here.

'_But…'_ The question suddenly bit into Claudia. _'Where exactly is here?'_

Was she dead? Had Parker deemed her so expendable that he'd brought an end to her sad life or would she awaken to find herself locked away in an even deeper level of the rubix cube that was Silent Hill's complex construction?

Well, wherever she now was, she was utterly alone. Even without opening her smarting eyes, she could feel the emptiness of whatever space held her, void of the overwhelming presence of Parker or that unfortunate man who they'd tormented so.

But something remained to keep her company, so intangible that the woman bearly noticed it, but sure enough it was there, lingering like a bitter after-taste in the heavy air. She inhaled it deeply, confirming her prediction: Smoke.

Claudia finally forced opened her eyes, ignoring their cries of protest as the mellow light dug itself sharply into them like a pair of out-stretched and malicious, gouging fingers.

A sea of never ending, familiar red met her bleary gaze.

The woman sat up, paying no heed to the crick in her spine as she shifted upright and took in her habitat, only to find the interior of the church staring straight back at her.

With a frown, Claudia rose to her feet.

It may very well be the same place but… it _felt _different to before, as if the heavy, sombre mood that had been pressing down on the building with enough force to crush its strong structure had been whisked away along with all those who had previously been here. The faint hint of smoke that weakly clung to this level of reality served as the only testament to what violence had come to pass in the sacred building. However, if you were to look at this almost idilic scene with the soft, rare sunlight streaming in through the stain-glass windows, projecting their warm colours onto the carpeted floor…Well, the idea that this place had born witness to death and destruction only moments before was almost painfully laughable.

Claudia's frown broke as the revelation slowly dawned on her:

She had prevailed.

Parker was gone. Unlike the smoke, there was not a single trace of his presence, almost as if some great celestial force had waved its hand, effortlessly wiping him from the very memory of existence…

And she was still here.

She had been given another chance to get back on the right road and walk its righteous path once more, another chance to save this world from wallowing in its own sea of sin, and another chance to set out to complete the task she had committed herself to all those years ago. She would linger in the shadows of disalusion no longer, nor let Parker's words hinder her progress…

'_Yes!' _The thoughts had begun racing through the pale woman's head at an almost dizzying pace as she stepped up to the church's proud alter. _'I will show them all that Paradise is not just a place reserved for only those who belelieve in it, but all mankind! Why, I shall open the doors to Her heavenly kingdom myself if need be'_

_SLAM_

Claudia looked up, eyes racing to the church's double doors as the sudden invasion of noise jammed up her rabid trail of thought. For a moment, all she could do was stare dumbly as her gaze fell on a figure who was so familiar, and yet not. At that very moment, if the circumstances had been just ever so slightly different, the woman would have jumped for joy at the sight of her one time friend.

"How did you get here?"

Heather, the girl who had suddenly found the world revolving around her said nothing, unable to stop her lip twitching with malice as her grip around the gun tightened.

8 8 8

_So what is there left for us to do?_

_We could follow this young girl who has suddenly stumbled into our story for a second time and watch in silence as her yarn spins out. However, there would be little point, for her own woeful tail is almost spent and all that remains for her to do is confront a woman who was once both a child and her only friend in the world._

_We could return to a barren strip of road where a man we have seen come so far yet fall twice as long lies, still screaming as what little is left to him comes apart, but that too would be pointless. There is no story left to tell there, and the very same goes for the two companion who can do nothing but listed to his cries._

_Save for the girl who would be a god, none of these characters have a future to look forward to and I think at this point, the best, no…only thing to do would be to turn our backs on this whole woeful affair…_

…_but just keep in mind a simple fact; that all this bitter sorrow that we have born witness to was born from one thing that lies dormant in all our hearts:_

_sin. _

**FIN**

A/N: Well, that really is it. Wow, it feels so odd to finally have this, something I have been working on for the best part of two years finally finished. Needles to say I'm going to miss sitting down every day to type out a little more of a story that's been gestating away inside my head even since I finished Silent Hill 2 what now must be four years ago.

I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to read and leave their comments, you people really have given me the commitment to keep on going through what was, at time, a somewhat turbulent relationship. Heh, I'm just sorry for putting you through so many spelling errors!

SlapDash – no problem, I probably would have gone mad if I hadn't written it down and whish I'd done so sooner. Only thing was I'd never written before and the idea scared the hell out of me. I'm truly flattered that you think me worthy of such praise.

E.P.O – Honestly, I don't know. The whole thing just spiraled out of control and seemed to stick that way…however, your stories are some of the most captivating things I've read on here for a long time and I'm just grateful you've chosen to share them with us.

I assure you, I will be back…but I think for the mean time I'm just going to stick to one-shots for a while…

Thank you and goodnight.


End file.
